The 14th Five-Year Plan clearly outlines the development of the industrial internet, and the government work report has called for its development for four consecutive years. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology resolutely implements the decisions and deployments of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council, and, together with relevant departments, issued the "Industrial Internet Innovation and Development Action Plan (2021-2023)," clarifying the development goals and key tasks for the industrial internet over the next three years. To better understand the situation of the industrial internet, the Industrial Internet Industry Alliance has organized the industry to systematically compile relevant content and launched a series of popular science Q&A columns on the industrial internet.
What is the current status of the application and development of the Industrial Internet across various industries?
The Industrial Internet has now extended to 40 major categories of the national economy, covering major manufacturing sectors such as raw materials, equipment, consumer goods, and electronics, as well as key industries in the real economy such as mining, power, and construction. It has achieved development on a larger scale, at a higher level, and in greater depth, resulting in a wide variety of integrated application practices.
The steel industry is a pillar industry of the national economy. Its manufacturing process is long and involves numerous steps, with segmented and continuous production. It faces major challenges, including difficulty in improving production and operational efficiency, severe overcapacity, significant pressure to achieve energy conservation, green and low-carbon development, and a relatively low level of inherent safety. Companies such as China Baowu Steel Group, Anshan Iron & Steel Group, and Maanshan Iron & Steel Group are actively exploring typical application scenarios of the Industrial Internet, including production process optimization, multi-process collaborative optimization, multi-base collaboration, and industry-finance integration. On the one hand, they are using in-depth data analysis to improve production efficiency, quality, and profitability; on the other hand, they are achieving collaborative response and comprehensive decision-making across multiple regions, links, and business systems, thereby creating new value and cultivating new growth drivers through model innovation.
As a vital sector of the national economy, the construction machinery industry provides essential equipment and basic tools for construction, manufacturing, and mining. Characterized by complex and diverse products, discrete production processes, and intricate supply chains, it also faces industry pain points such as low production efficiency, weak product maintenance capabilities, and intense competition due to product homogeneity. Leading construction machinery companies like Sany Heavy Industry, XCMG Group, and Zoomlion are actively leveraging the Industrial Internet to accelerate their digital transformation. Through predictive maintenance and remote, visual management of equipment via the Industrial Internet, they not only reduce equipment maintenance costs and improve the dynamic allocation efficiency of production resources, but also extend into service models such as supply chain finance and financial leasing, achieving a "manufacturing + service" model and creating new growth opportunities.
The home appliance industry is characterized by rapid technological updates, short product development cycles, and high product homogeneity. Currently, it faces core pain points such as difficulty in meeting personalized demands, high requirements for production precision and efficiency, long order delivery cycles, insufficient quality control, and inventory turnover pressure. Light industrial home appliance companies such as Gree, Haier, Midea, and TCL are leveraging the Industrial Internet to explore applications in large-scale customization, product design optimization, quality management, production monitoring and analysis, and equipment management. This aims to improve user experience, first-pass yield, and production efficiency, while saving equipment maintenance costs and meeting customers' personalized needs.
The electronics and information industry is a knowledge- and technology-intensive industry, characterized by a wide variety of products, short production cycles, and rapid iteration. This places high demands on quality control, standardized operations and management, and agile market response. Companies like China Electronics, Huawei, and ZTE are exploring typical applications of the Industrial Internet, including visualized equipment management, improved product yield, optimized inventory management, optimized end-to-end scheduling, and multi-factory collaboration. On the one hand, they are using new technologies such as machine vision and big data analytics to improve efficiency in quality management, equipment fault diagnosis, and product inventory management. On the other hand, they are building interconnected factories to optimize enterprise-level decision-making and enable agile demand response.
The mining industry , which extracts and develops natural energy or processes natural resources into fuel and power, currently faces major challenges such as resource scarcity, high pressure for safety supervision and environmental protection, real-time equipment monitoring, and stringent requirements for refined management. Mining companies such as Shanxi Lu'an Xinyuan Coal Mine, Shaanxi Coal Group Xiaobaodang Coal Mine, Shandong Gold Sanshandao Gold Mine, and Inner Mongolia Baiyun Obo Rare Earth Mine are utilizing "5G + Industrial Internet" to conduct intelligent mining and production control, environmental monitoring and safety protection, and underground inspections. This liberates workers from dangerous and arduous working environments and promotes green and safe production in the mining industry.
The power industry is leveraging "5G + Industrial Internet" to integrate with all aspects of power generation, transmission, transformation, distribution, and consumption, forming a new control and monitoring network. This optimizes processes, significantly reduces carbon emissions, lowers the uncertainty of clean energy grid connection, and enhances the access capabilities of electric vehicles and microgrids, while reducing costs for upstream and downstream enterprises and energy customers. Companies and institutions on the power generation, grid, and consumption sides, including China Huaneng, China Southern Power Grid, State Grid, Chint Group, and TBEA, are actively exploring these models, developing typical application modes such as early warning and energy-saving efficiency improvement for power generation equipment, grid-side dispatch optimization and integrated management of the entire process, and improved service quality and optimized electricity consumption strategies for the consumption side. These modes respectively achieve early prediction and proactive maintenance of equipment failures, measurable energy data, and reduced electricity costs.
The construction industry is characterized by long project construction cycles, large capital investment, complex management of project stakeholders, and high personnel turnover. In the future, it will move towards industrialization, intelligentization, and greening supported by the comprehensive application of technologies such as the Industrial Internet and BIM. Companies like China Construction Science & Industry Corporation (CSCEC), Glodon, Sany Construction, and Beijing Jianyi are leveraging the Industrial Internet to explore applications such as digital collaborative design and integrated delivery, virtual-physical integrated construction collaborative management, and intelligent manufacturing of prefabricated buildings. This enables virtual execution and optimization throughout the entire project process, significantly improving design efficiency, construction quality, cost and schedule control, and construction safety. On the other hand, addressing the needs of building energy consumption optimization, safety emergency response, and access control, some leading construction companies are exploring applications of the Industrial Internet in energy management, asset monitoring and maintenance, and virtual drills to achieve intelligent and safe operation.
