Jinan is on the fast track to advancing its information technology sector and has set itself a goal of establishing an industrial cluster in five years worth some 100 billion yuan ($14.9 billion), noted Wang Zhonglin, Party secretary of the city.

Wang made his remarks at a high-level conference for multinational corporations held in Jinan, in eastern Shandong province, on June 5.

The conference, themed around new generation information technology, gathered Fortune Global 500 companies, well-known transnational corporations and innovative companies including Intel Corp, Oracle Corp, Mizuho Bank and Micro Focus.

Representatives shared cutting-edge technologies, policies, development and investment trends in the fields of artificial intelligence, integrated circuits, the industrial internet and the internet of things, big data and cloud computing.

According to Wang, Jinan sees rapid development in store for its new generation information technology sectors.

The city's scale for its digital information industry as well as intelligent manufacturing and high-end equipment industry both exceeded 300 billion yuan.

One sign of the times: a state-of-the-art E-class supercomputer with a speed of up to 10 quadrillion calculations per second has been in use since 2018. Elsewhere, Sinotruk has rolled off the world's first production line for driverless electric truck.

Official data showed that the city's digital economy reached 290 billion yuan in value, accounting for about 37 percent of its total economic output in 2018. Its software and information service sectors ranked first in the province.

Meng Xiang, general manager of Oracle China Corp's Shandong branch, said when interviewed after the conference that Oracle had made a great positive progress in promoting Shandong's growth shift from mature industries to new ones.

Officials said the innovation center project will continue to provide big data analysis and solutions for institutions in Jinan, especially in the fields of intelligent manufacturing and medical care.

A conference featuring top multinational corporations is held in Jinan, in eastern Shandong province, on June 5. [Photo/jinan.dzwww.com]

Wang Zhonglin, Party secretary of Jinan gives a keynote speech to the conference on June 5.  [Photo/jinan.dzwww.com]