Zone carries torch in race for innovative growth

The development engines for the Xiamen National Torch Hi-Tech Industry Development Zone, or Torch Hi-Tech Zone as it is more simply known, are talent, technology and innovation.

Unless people see it with their own eyes, they find it hard to believe that a solar cell can be made by printing. Yet Xiamen Weihua Solar Ltd is doing just that. On a pilot production line solar batteries are "printed out" in different colors on a printing machine, just like newspaper.

The company has also made a breakthrough in the Incident Photon-to-Electron Conversion Efficiency, or IPCE, of perovskite solar cells, which include an absorber commonly made of a hybrid organic-inorganic material as the active layer.

Fan Bin, the general manager of the company, who graduated from China's prestigious Tsinghua University, said the company's success can be credited to the Torch Hi-Tech Zone's support, financial aid and guidance.

Weihua is just one of the many innovation-producing tech companies based in the zone.

To accelerate the construction of an innovation base and attract more talent, the zone has been building more R&D centers and incubators and encouraging and supporting companies and industries to build their own research institutions. For instance, a national LED application production quality supervision and inspection center has been established in the zone.

"In the past, it was basically our job to create such platforms and attract talent, now we are encouraging companies to do so," said one member of the administration commission of Torch High-Tech Zone.

The zone has not only contributed to its clients' development it has also facilitated the upgrading of industry chains. The Tsinghua Unigroup, for example, not only brought more than 30 unicircuit companies and their core businesses to the zone, it is also introducing IT research and development companies and other companies with links to Tsinghua University.

Zhao Weiguo, chairman and president of Tsinghua Unigroup, said the development of an industry chain can be boosted by 50 yuan ($8) by a chip costing just 1 yuan to produce.

The high-tech innovation in the zone is laying the foundation for Xiamen to build a new industrial chain worth hundreds of billion yuan.

To inspire innovation and invention, the Torch High-Tech Zone has enhanced its efforts to protect companies' intellectual property by introducing support polices. These have yielded great results. According to official data, from 2008 to 2014, the number of invention patents filed by companies within the zone grew nearly 12-fold, while the number of new practical patents increased more than 20-fold.

In recent years, the Torch High-Tech Zone has been trying to act as a bridge between industry, research institutes and universities.

The zone has developed strong cooperation with many prestigious Chinese universities, including Peking University and Tsinghua University, as well as the local universities.

Take Tsinghua University, for example; Tsinghua has set up a startup base and a specific support program. Now the base in Xiamen has five companies. And more outstanding startup programs are expected to settle in the zone with the launch of a new platform that will seek to transfer innovative ideas to industry.

On November 2014, Xiamen municipal government, and Tsinghua University and alumni of Tsinghua University in Hsingchu of Taiwan signed an agreement to jointly build a research institute. The aim is for the institute to be a world-class innovation center and high-tech platform, and also a talent cultivator.

After the institute is established, the Torch High-Tech Zone will be a major force industrializing its research results. Huang Wenhui, head of the administration commission of the zone, said the institute will benefit the development of the zone and help drive the economic restructuring of Xiamen.