On November 27, the 10th World Intelligent Manufacturing Conference kicked off in Nanjing. CITIC Group's Nanjing Iron & Steel Co Ltd (NISCO) was selected for the first batch of pioneering smart factories in recognition for its project of "intelligent factory for customization of special steel with deep collaboration with industry chain" after over two decades of work in intelligent manufacturing. With this, CITIC Group has established one pioneering-level and seven outstanding-level smart factories.

NISCO has deeply integrated AI with steel processes and developed intelligent algorithms for various scenarios such as visual inspection, process optimization, quality prediction, and equipment maintenance. This enables a real-time, cross-interface optimized production model. In June, NISCO partnered with Huawei to launch the YuanyeSteel Large Model, which uses a cluster of intelligent models to break through the limits of traditional single-model approaches. So far, over 30 smart applications have already been deployed.

NISCO has established a unique industry-wide data collection and governance system, deploying over a million data collection points to achieve real-time sensing and aggregation of data across the entire steel rolling process. Leveraging a data lakehouse platform and robust data standards, the company maintains a core data ingestion rate of over 95%, crucial for smart manufacturing. NISCO is also a pioneer among listed companies in registering data assets and was selected as one of National Data Administration's pilot projects for trusted data spaces innovation and development in 2025.

Through its industry network connecting suppliers, customers, and partners, NISCO enables collaborative innovation across R&D, manufacturing, logistics, and services, partnering with multiple industry leaders.

To date, NISCO's smart manufacturing solutions have been successfully implemented in over 100 companies across sectors including steel, non-ferrous metals, chemicals, and equipment manufacturing.