From Intelligent Production Lines to Smart Factories, HGTECH’s High-end Shipbuilding Intelligent Manufacturing Project Has Made New Progress

Recently, HGTECH signed a cooperation agreement with Shandong Xinneng Shipbuilding Co. Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “Xinneng Shipbuilding”) on shipbuilding intelligent manufacturing. And the two parties will cooperate on the construction of a smart shipyard around the clean energy shipbuilding manufacturing base.

Xinneng Shipbuilding is a modern shipbuilding enterprise specializing in the manufacturing and repair of clean energy vessels such as LNG and electric-powered ships. It is committed to establishing China’s first green, intelligent, modern, and standardized clean energy shipbuilding base which integrates research and development, design, and intelligent manufacturing together. Upon completion, the project will have an annual production capacity of 400 clean energy vessels and repairing capacity of 100 ones, driving the development of adjacent industries such as lithium, hydrogen, and electric propulsion systems, forming a billion-dollar-level inland river green shipbuilding intelligent manufacturing cluster.

The “Full-Process Smart Factory for Clean Energy Shipbuilding” project undertaken by HGTECH includes a joint workshop project involving processes such as yard material handling, steel plate pretreatment, plate cutting, subassembly welding, and deck welding. In the design and implementation process, independently-developed technologies have been employed including high-end laser cutting equipment, laser composite welding equipment, full format multi-head marking and coding equipment. The project also utilizes intelligent generation and recognition technology, intelligent mixed nesting technology, high-precision recognition and positioning technology, AI+vision intelligent sorting system, yard management system, intelligent central control system, digital twin system, and other self-developed information technology, realizing full-process intelligent shipbuilding from raw materials to hull welding.

Intelligent yard and material storage management system achieve crane scheduling through integrated interaction, enabling the interconnection and interoperability of inventory business processes, information, and data between the yard and material storage areas. This integration forms the “brain” of intelligent yard and material storage operations.

Intelligent central control system is an integrated information system that combines equipment scheduling and control. By facilitating seamless information exchange between equipment and production plans, it directly controls various types of conveying and manufacturing equipment, accomplishing automated scheduling and operations throughout the entire process of delivery, cutting, sorting, transportation, and storage. The system utilizes algorithms to optimize part production and allocate production resources to minimize waste during the manufacturing process.

Digital twin system achieves high-fidelity replication of production lines through precise modeling and real-time rendering of equipment and production layout. By IoT real-time data, it synchronizes the virtual and physical movements of the production line, enabling dynamic reconstruction of production resources for the production line/workshop, and constructing a digital twin smart factory.

Facing the trend of transformation and upgrading in the shipbuilding industry, numerous domestic shipyards are currently advancing from automation to intelligence. The “Laser Cutting and Blanking Automated Production Line” jointly developed by HGTECH and Wuhu Shipyard has been officially put into operation at the Weihai Base. This workshop achieves high-level collaboration between humans and machines, reducing labor costs by approximately 40%. The intelligent central control system autonomously allocates resources within the factory, achieving an automation rate of up to 80% in the workshop. Integrating advanced technology with intelligent management, coupled with physical security measures, enhances safety while boosting efficiency, making it a “super factory” in the shipbuilding industry. Weihai Base mainly constructs high-value-added ship types such as 3000 to 9000 PCTCs and 50KMR oil tankers, with a planned capacity of 800,000 tons and an annual output value of 5 billion yuan.

From the commissioning of intelligent production lines in the shipbuilding industry to the signing of contracts for full-process smart factories, HGTECH, with laser equipment and end-to-end digital management as its core, has been launching customized solutions tailored to the personalized needs of shipbuilding enterprises. This accelerates the realization of integrated solutions for laser-intelligent manufacturing of ship components and the coordinated upgrade of high-end shipbuilding intelligent technology, continually stimulating new vitality in the high-end shipbuilding market.

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