Located at the source of the value chain and at the front end of the innovation chain, industrial design plays a leading role in driving the development of the manufacturing industry and industrial upgrading. On the afternoon of March 3, the Award Ceremony of the 2nd “Wucai Cup” Industrial Design Competition was held in Tongxiang, Jiaxing City.

Sponsored by Bureau of Economy and Information of Jiaxing and hosted by Industrial Design Association of Jiaxing, “Wucai Cup” Industrial Design Competition is an influential design competition of the Yangtze River Delta region, aiming to tap the innovation potential of industrial design professionals and institutions of this region, display excellent industrial design achievements, and commercialize those achievements to boost Jiaxing’s manufacturing industry.

Since “Notice on Organizing ‘Wucai Cup’ Industrial Design Competition of Jiaxing 2022” was issued by Bureau of Economy and Information of Jiaxing last October, the organization committee received a total of 451 entries from outstanding enterprises, university students and independent designers of the Yangtze River Delta. 67 innovative and forward-looking winning works were selected after several rounds of evaluations, reviews and contestants’ defence, and nine entries won product design awards and 28 ones won concept work awards.

“Winning this award is a recognition and affirmation of our company. We are greatly honored. This year, we will accelerate the R&D of new products to boom Jiaxing’s manufacturing industry through industrial design,” said joyfully a manager of Zhejiang Volte Medical Device Co., Ltd. after it won the product design award with its multi-functional, folding, digital and visual laryngoscope products.

In recent years, Jiaxing has intensified efforts to take a design and innovation-driven path, drive the high-end development of the manufacturing industry, optimize industrial development environment, give full play to the leading and collaborative role of the industrial design in industrial integration, business model innovation, new technology application, new field expansion and the industrialization of innovation achievements to construct a national-level service-oriented manufacturing demonstration city and boost the high-end, intelligent and green development of the manufacturing industry.

At present in Jiaxing, there are three major fashion industry designs bases, i.e. Haining Leather Industry Base, Puyuan “320” Creative Square and Pinghu Clothing Culture and Creation Park, quite a few industrial agglomeration areas for smart home furnishing, electrical and electronic production and mechanical equipment manufacturing, many famous design enterprises like Haitao Fashion, Feilingfeixun, Baoding Clothing as well as many famous design brands such as Anzheng, Yaying, Xinxiu, Youpon, Dingmei, Enlong and Qisheng.

Up to the present, Jiaxing has built two national-level industrial design centers, namely, Industrial Design Center of China Electronics (Jiaxing) and R&D Design Center of Wentai Mobile Terminal, 43 provincial-level industrial design centers like Yat, 3 provincial-level industrial design bases and 2  provincial-level key enterprise-based design institutes like Anzheng and Xinxiu.

Industrial design is the “accelerator” to promote the high-quality development of Jiaxing’s manufacturing industry. In 2022, the added value of the cultural manufacturing industry and fashion industry totaled 13.79 billion yuan and 27.21 billion yuan respectively, ranking second and third in Zhejiang, according to statistics.

“We will take this competition as an opportunity to further improve and publicize Jiaxing’s relevant policies in terms of industrial design, attract more industrial designers and institutions to Jiaxing to upgrade local traditional industries; we will encourage enterprises to apply to construct national, provincial and municipal industrial design centers to enhance their innovation sense,” said an official from Bureau of Economy and Information of Jiaxing. This bureau will encourage those design works having won awards to cooperate with relevant industries to commercialize their design achievements to construct Jiaxing into a leading city in smart and innovative manufacturing.

At the award ceremony, the award-winning works were displayed, and some agreements were signed among universities, enterprises and associations, and the unveiling ceremony was held for the provincial-level industrial design centers of Zhejiang in 2022.