China sees surge in new "digital intelligence" jobs

In a FAW Jiefang Group Co., Ltd. factory in Changchun, northeast China's Jilin Province, senior intelligent vehicle design engineer Bai Zhigang is fine-tuning a smart heavy-duty truck.

With 19 years of experience in the automotive industry, Bai has transitioned from traditional truck design to the development of intelligent connected vehicles, riding the wave of China's rapid development in intelligent manufacturing.

In his new profession, he equips vehicles with sensors to enhances their autonomous recognition capabilities and select appropriate controllers to enable autonomous driving in specific scenarios. This helps reduce driver fatigue and improve safety.

"Our job is to figure out how to bring value to users through intelligent driving," Bai said. "Specifically, we are responsible for the entire system architecture design, software development and calibration."

In recent years, China's intelligent connected vehicle industry has seen explosive growth as the country strives to take the lead in the reshuffling of the global auto industry. Bai's career shift reflects the conventional to intelligent transformation of China's auto industry.

As China moves toward high-quality development, new professions are emerging across the country. In 2024, the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security announced the official recognition of 19 new professions, including intelligent connected vehicle maintenance technician, intelligent manufacturing system maintenance technician and industrial Internet maintenance technician.

China's high-speed rail industry — a golden calling card of intelligent manufacturing — has also seen the emergence of new job categories. On an assembly line operated by CRRC Changchun Railway Vehicles Co., Ltd., dozens of rail vehicles were assembled in an orderly fashion.

Senior engineer Bao Hongyang guided operators using smart wrenches to apply torque to bolts. The wrenches' built-in sensors uploaded the torque data to a connected system immediately.

"Based on the data uploaded to the backend, we can confirm that the system is running normally," Bao explained.

In the past, there was no way to record torque data, and quality of work depended solely on the workers' sense of responsibility, making it impossible to trace quality issues. Now, data speaks for itself. Only when the set standard torque is reached, can a bolt be considered properly tightened, according to Bao.

Since joining CRRC Changchun in 2008, Bao has been responsible for the design of instructions for large numerical control machines that mill parts such as doors and windows for high-speed trains. With the increasing speeds of high-speed trains, intelligent manufacturing has been integrated into the entire life cycle of rail vehicles in China.

Bao now needs to design and maintain a large number of intelligent manufacturing systems, enabling "silent" equipment to "speak" through data, thereby improving production efficiency and minimizing product failure rates.

At a substation in Jilin City, Jilin Province, power quality manager Li Sihan monitors readings on a dashboard, checking a newly installed electric heat-tracing device. Li developed the maintainable electric heat-tracing device, which has significantly reduced power outages and maintenance costs in the area.

"Traditional heat-tracing belts require a complete power shutdown for maintenance, which severely affects power supply quality," Li said. "With the maintainable electric heat-tracing device, we can maintain fault points without shutting down power, and work in a localized manner."

In Li's view, the emergence of the power quality management profession reflects China's shift from ensuring power supply to ensuring power quality in its power system.

Today, China's intelligent manufacturing equipment sector continues to expand, with multiple national demonstration factories, provincial digital workshops and smart factories being established.

Data shows that over 90 percent of these demonstration factories have applied technologies such as artificial intelligence and digital twins. With the efforts of workers like Bai, Bao and Li, China is moving from being a manufacturing giant to becoming a smart manufacturing powerhouse.