The Zhongtian–Zhiyuan Embodied AI Innovation Center has entered trial operation in Chongchuan District, Nantong, Jiangsu Province — the first flagship facility co-built by Zhiyuan Robotics (AGIBOT) and industrial group Zhongtian Technology (ZTT). With a total investment of 100 million yuan (about $14 million), the center was formally unveiled this week at Nantong's industrial AI application conference, attended by Mayor Zhang Tong and provincial industry officials.
The facility is jointly built by five parties — ZTT, Zhiyuan Robotics, Haohui Intelligence, Shuchuan Intelligence and Huixi Intelligence. It focuses on embodied AI data collection and annotation, model and algorithm iteration, and the custom development and scenario deployment of industrial intelligent robots, integrating research laboratories, achievement exhibition areas and talent training under one roof.
Hardware In Place, First Systems Debugged
During a citywide project observation tour on July 22–23, embodied robots at the center were already performing data collection and simulation training tasks with staff assistance. Officials confirmed that robots, sensors and computing infrastructure are installed, and that the data collection and simulation training systems have completed their first round of joint debugging — laying the data groundwork for later scenario applications.
Factory Scenarios Meet Frontier Algorithms
Xie Shuhong, chief engineer of ZTT Group, said the company will feed its smart manufacturing scenario experience into the center. ZTT — listed in Shanghai (600522.SS) with businesses spanning optical communications, power transmission, submarine cables and new energy — has mapped its manufacturing operations into a scenario map covering nine major stages and 50 scenario categories, and runs its industrial AI stack on the self-developed "Tianji" industrial large-model platform, organized around a "one platform, two cores, three layers, multiple applications" architecture.
On ZTT's production lines, Tianji-based models already handle tasks such as monitoring braiding-machine spindle margins, visual inspection of aluminum strip surfaces, and predictive maintenance of optical fiber winding equipment — experience the center can now draw on for robot training. Zhiyuan Robotics, among China's best-funded humanoid startups, brings the hardware carriers and motion-control algorithms. The partners frame their synergy as "industrial scenarios + frontier algorithms + hardware carriers + state-backed capital empowerment."
"We have rich industrial scenarios in communications, power, submarine cables and new energy, and our production involves large numbers of repetitive tasks," Xie said. "Robot-assisted production can further improve safety, standardization and efficiency." The center plans to package standardized, replicable solutions for promotion across Nantong's pillar industries, including shipbuilding, textiles and new-generation information technology.
Nantong's Industrial AI Bet
The center anchors Nantong's broader push to become an industrial AI benchmark city. The same conference saw a National Robot Testing and Certification Center Nantong branch and China Mobile's Yangtze River Delta AI+ industry empowerment center land in the city, alongside twelve signed projects spanning brain-computer interfaces, industrial robots, AI green manufacturing and offshore intelligent inspection.
For Zhiyuan Robotics, which recently passed 15,000 cumulative robot production, the Nantong facility extends its strategy of anchoring humanoid platforms to real industrial data. For ZTT, it is a route to turn decades of factory know-how into embodied AI assets. What both sides need most in the embodied AI race — high-quality, real-world training data at scale — is exactly what a working factory district can provide.
