A robot assembles auto parts at a workshop in Qingdao, East China's Shandong province on Jan 30, 2023. [Photo/VCG] 

On the new journey towards high-quality development, Shandong continues to make efforts in strategic emerging industries such as metaverse, artificial intelligence and virtual reality, and has made remarkable achievements in developing smart manufacturing.

The metaverse is a trending concept that loosely refers to an immersive virtual world that combines technologies like virtual reality and augmented reality. Though still nascent, companies globally have been gearing up efforts in developing and investing in metaverse-related technologies. It is becoming the prototype of the next generation internet and an important track to drive development of the global digital economy and technology innovation, say industry experts.

In 2023, the Shandong provincial government work report proposed to vigorously cultivate innovative enterprises and support 1,000 science and technology enterprises to carry out industry-university-research collaborative innovation in fields such as synthetic biology and metaverse.

The province plans to invest heavily to promote the breakthrough development of digital industries such as integrated circuits, ultra-high-definition video and virtual reality, and support Weifang in the construction of a metaverse industrial park.

With the continuous and rapid growth of the new generation of information technology industry in Weifang, the industrial scale has exceeded 100 billion yuan ($14.49 billion), forming a complete consumer electronics industry chain and a photoelectric products industry chain in the city, which has laid a solid foundation for the city to develop the metaverse industry.

Jinan, capital of Shandong, has launched an action plan to promote the innovation and development of that industry (2022-25).

By 2025, Jinan will have cultivated more than 100 metaverse enterprises and built a number of metaverse industrial clusters, with the scale of metaverse related industries reaching 100 billion yuan.