In recent years, Qingdao City, Shandong Province, has stepped up efforts in policy formulation and platform construction. It has nurtured 10 national-level industrial design centers, 55 provincial-level ones and 227 municipal-level ones, initially establishing an enterprise design and innovation system with industrial design centers as the backbone, which effectively empowers the transformation and upgrading of the manufacturing industry. The main experiences and practices are as follows:
Strengthen policy guidance for industrial design: Qingdao has issued Several Policies and Measures for Accelerating the High-Quality Development of Advanced Manufacturing Industry and its supporting implementation rules, offering rewards to enterprises recognized as national or provincial industrial design centers. It promotes collaborative innovation in industrial design, encouraging manufacturing enterprises to accelerate the development of customized design, network collaborative design, cloud-based design and experience interactive design by purchasing industrial design services.
Build robust public service platforms for industrial design: The city pushes for the in-depth integration of industrial design into high-value-added links of the industrial chain such as creativity and R&D, and guides the precise matching between industrial design demand and supply. The Tsinghua-Qingdao Academy of Arts & Science Innovation has set up the Qingdao Industrial Design Collaborative Innovation Center; Qingdao Lunyun Design and Research Institute has empowered more than 20 upstream and downstream enterprises in the industrial chain; and Haier Innovation Design Center has been built into a national demonstration platform for public services to small and medium-sized enterprises.
Cultivate the industrial ecosystem for industrial design: Qingdao has successively held 8 sessions of the “Mayor’s Cup” Industrial Design Competition and 5 sessions of the Qingdao Design Festival, continuously driving the aggregation of high-quality design resources. These events provide an excellent platform for enterprises and designers to showcase their talents and connect with resources, fostering a social atmosphere that values industrial design. Enterprises in Qingdao have won 13 China Excellent Industrial Design Awards and over 400 international industrial design awards such as the Red Dot Design Award, iF Design Award (Germany) and IDEA Award (USA).
Promote the transformation of industrial design achievements: Qingdao organizes enterprises to participate in exhibitions and exchanges at previous International Industrial Design Expositions, and regularly carries out activities such as “Design Enterprises Tour”, “Design into Universities” and “Design Wisdom Sharing Sessions”. It has implemented 60 key projects for collaborative tackling of industrial technological innovation through the public bidding system, promoting industrial design to deeply empower the city’s advantageous industries including smart home appliances, rail transit, high-end equipment, rubber tires and instruments. Notably, industrial design concepts have been fully integrated into the R&D and production of intelligent equipment such as the Robot Vision Positioning Automatisk Film Applicator Machine, which optimizes the film application process for high-precision components in smart home appliances and high-end equipment through humanized design and intelligent control, significantly improving product consistency and production efficiency.
