MaHui Exchange | Foxconn and Source Code Capital Explore Smart Manufacturing Together to Accelerate Digital Transformation

On April 14, 2023, Foxconn's Intelligent Manufacturing Platform and Source Code Capital co-hosted a one-day industry symposium at Foxconn's Longhua Science Park in Shenzhen. Centered on "digital transformation," the event aimed to foster deep interaction and business collaboration among smart manufacturing companies and build an industrial ecosystem. More than 20 attendees participated, including CEOs and senior executives from Source Code Capital portfolio companies such as Mech-Mind Robotics, Senmu Leishi, Magic Warehouse Robotics, Dinnar, Seeya Technology, Poweroak, Deltron, and Sainuo Biotech, as well as representatives from Renai Capital and Shanghai Science and Technology Innovation Center.

As a globally renowned manufacturing enterprise and one of the key representatives of the WEF's Lighthouse Factories, Foxconn has been committed to introducing Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies to drive digital transformation and boost production efficiency. Source Code Capital, a tech-focused investment firm, has long paid close attention to and invested in the smart manufacturing sector. Through this collaboration, both sides sought to convey Foxconn's vision of working with more smart manufacturing companies to explore digital transformation, drive change, and further enhance core competitiveness in the digital era.

South Gate of Foxconn's Longhua Campus, Shenzhen

On the morning of April 14, Foxconn led attendees on a tour of the mold production line at its Longhua campus, offering a firsthand look at Foxconn's manufacturing processes and technologies. Following the tour, four speakers delivered keynote presentations: Jun Ma, senior manager of Foxconn's CAD CAM CENTRE Precision Machinery/Mold Intelligent Manufacturing Platform; Qi Luo, head of Foxconn's SMP-SMT Technology Center; Zhongtang Song, operations lead of Foxconn's Intelligent Manufacturing Accelerator; and Wenjin Tao, head of Foxconn North America's Industrial AI Digital Product Development, joining remotely from the United States.

Jun Ma Senior Manager, Foxconn Precision Machinery/Mold Intelligent Manufacturing Platform

Tianlan Shao, CEO of Mech-Mind, introducing his company

Exchange session at the event

Yinghua Qin, CEO of Dinnar

Bo Liu, Co-founder of Seeya Technology

At the event

Drawing on the morning's tour, Jun Ma, senior manager of Foxconn's CAD CAM CENTRE Precision Machinery/Mold Intelligent Manufacturing Platform, explained the platform's mold manufacturing capabilities and layout. He introduced their developed digital, fully 3D paperless, multi-site collaborative mold design platform. The platform enables comprehensive process control, records and preserves all information, collects issues and resolves development pain points, and generates standardized documentation — all contributing to improved mold production efficiency and quality.

Qi Luo, head of Foxconn's SMT Technology Center, delivered a presentation titled Foxconn's Smart Manufacturing Development Strategy, focusing on the goals and direction of Foxconn's smart manufacturing transformation. He detailed Foxconn's needs across specific digital application scenarios, including RPA process robots, AI 3D industrial quality inspection, intelligent warehousing, industrial simulation, AR-assisted training and inspection maintenance, digital twins, the industrial metaverse, flexible force control, multi-machine management, hand-eye coordination robots, and MES/WMS systems.

Wenjin Tao, joining via video from the United States, shared insights on people-centric approaches to addressing challenges in manufacturing digital transformation. He outlined three distinct digital implementation methods and pathways: achieving digitization indirectly through standardized work actions (Illumake), achieving it directly through active recognition (OPTIMO), and digitizing human knowledge through natural language (Foxconn GPT) to further build industrial digital humans. These three approaches and pathways enable faster implementation of BOL (Build-Operate-Localize), ultimately realizing the One Digital Foxconn goal.

Zhongtang Song, operations lead of Foxconn's Intelligent Manufacturing Accelerator, gave attendees a detailed overview of the accelerator's development history and milestones. He noted that the accelerator represents an open innovation smart manufacturing ecosystem built on Foxconn's supply chain resources in collaboration with internal and external enterprises. It helps companies accelerate digital transformation, introduces critical advanced technologies, empowers small and medium enterprises, and builds its own ecosystem.

In the afternoon, Xiuyan Yu, technical lead of Foxconn's Lighthouse Factory under the Intelligent Manufacturing Platform, shared insights on Foxconn's Lighthouse Factories and related scenario requirements. Peng Gao, technical lead of intelligent logistics at Foxconn's Intelligent Manufacturing Platform, focused on pain points and needs in intelligent warehousing scenarios.

Additionally, leaders from Source Code Capital portfolio companies and other enterprise representatives shared their product and technology strengths and implementation experience, discussing applications of smart manufacturing in production operations and how to further strengthen industrial collaboration and technological innovation.

Mech-Mind Robotics Technology Co., Ltd. is a well-known domestic provider of AI + 3D + intelligent industrial robot solutions, a high-tech enterprise focused on R&D, production, and sales of AI + 3D vision hardware and software products. Mech-Mind's intelligent industrial robot solutions have been deployed across automotive, home appliances, steel, food, logistics warehousing, 3C, new energy, and pharmaceuticals, covering applications such as depalletizing and palletizing, piece picking, feeding, assembly, inspection/measurement, gluing, and positioning.

Dinnar is a high-tech enterprise specializing in machine vision automated inspection, developing and producing high-precision, high-reliability automated inspection equipment for global customers. The company provides supporting standard products including industrial cameras, industrial lenses, vision light sources, and professional image processing software, while also offering integrated professional services encompassing project evaluation, solution design, installation and commissioning, technical consulting, and training.

Seeya Technology (SEEYA) is a high-tech enterprise specializing in R&D, design, production, and sales of next-generation semiconductor OLEDoS displays. Seeya is committed to building an OLEDoS display application ecosystem, providing customers with end-to-end micro-display solutions. Its core team consists primarily of talent from semiconductor, OLED display, and specialty display technology fields, with solid technical foundations and abundant market resources. Over 90% of team members have R&D, design, and process backgrounds. All Seeya employees are dedicated to delivering high-value products and services to customers and users.

In the final session, both sides organized a closed-door roundtable limited to select companies, where representatives engaged in deeper one-on-one discussions about potential future collaboration directions.

Going forward, Foxconn will continue to lead the industry, leveraging its vast manufacturing scenarios to serve as a pioneering model for technology and smart manufacturing enterprises, empowering small and medium startups, and applying excellent advanced technologies in practice to create core technological value and promote the upgrading and development of China's manufacturing industry. We firmly believe that digital transformation is not only a crucial means of driving industrial upgrading and transformation, but also key to improving production efficiency and reducing costs.