From November 21 to 22, 2024, “Academician Pilot and Hebei Steel Industry Digital Transformation Alliance Enterprises Matchmaking Activity (Yongyang Iron & Steel Station)” was successfully held in Yongnian District, Handan City, Hebei Province, under the guidance of Hebei Department of Industry and Information Technology, hosted by China Unicom Intelligent Iron & Steel Corps, organized by Metallurgical Industry Planning and Research Institute (MIPRI), and supported by Hebei Iron & Steel Industry Digital Transformation Union (HIITU). was successfully held in Yongnian District, Handan City, Hebei Province. This activity especially invited Northeastern University, Wang Guodong, academician team to Hebei in-depth docking research Yongyang Steel, sharing cutting-edge digital intelligence technology, guiding enterprises to optimize the production process through the application of the model, to promote the development of new quality productivity of the iron and steel enterprises, and to lead the development of iron and steel innovation in Hebei." Wang Guodong, academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and professor of Northeastern University, Wang Hefu, second-level inspector of the Department of Industry and Information Technology of Hebei Province, and He Wei, deputy general manager of Hebei Unicom and head of China Unicom's Smart Steel Army Corps, attended the event. More than 200 people from the province's iron and steel enterprises, city and county industry and information departments, China Unicom's Smart Iron and Steel Army Corps, Hebei Bank, Metallurgical Industry Planning and Research Institute, and other organizations participated in the event.
 

This activity includes leadership speech, academician team theme report and iron and steel digital intelligence cutting-edge technology sharing, Yongyang Special Steel innovation practice sharing, iron and steel digital transformation of the excellent program sharing, the provincial Department of Industry and Information Technology Steel Division work interpretation, Yongyang Special Steel digital construction tour and into the enterprise research a total of seven links.
 

In the speech session, Zhang Ning, Mayor of Yongnian District, Handan City, Du Xiaofang, General Manager of Yongyang Special Steel Group, He Wei, Deputy General Manager of Hebei Unicom and Head of China Unicom's Intelligent Iron and Steel Army Corps, and Wang Hefu, Second Grade Inspector of the Hebei Provincial Department of Industry and Information Technology, delivered speeches for the event respectively.

Handan Yongnian District Governor Zhang Ning said in the digital transformation, Yongnian District in-depth implementation of national, provincial and municipal digital transformation policies and measures, to promote the green and low-carbon transformation of the iron and steel industry, to empower the development of enterprises with digital technology, and vigorously promote the application of 5G scenarios, Yongyang Special Steel has successfully built the province's first “5G + full-connectivity smart factory”. In terms of digital intelligence empowerment, 4 digital transformation benchmark enterprises have been cultivated, 767 enterprises are on the cloud, and 15 enterprises have been selected for the provincial industrial Internet innovation demonstration project; in terms of industrial cooperation, Yongyang Special Steel, as the “leader” of the iron and steel industry in the region, is speeding up the development of the whole chain of “equipment+products” and the development of the whole chain of “equipment+products”. In terms of industrial cooperation, Yongyang Special Steel, as the “leader” of steel industry in our region, is accelerating the development of “equipment+products” and accelerating the transformation to green and low-carbon; fastener industry, as the leading industry in our region, is a typical “steel-eating” industry, with the output reaching 6 million tons in 2023, accounting for 58% of the national market share and 28% of the global market share. The digital and intelligent transformation of enterprises has taken a solid step forward, thanks to the strong guidance of the Provincial Department of Industry and Information Technology, and the strong support of the Provincial Digital Transformation Alliance and China Unicom. At present, the steel digital transformation is a general trend, digital intelligence to empower enterprises is the direction of change, Yongnian will follow the trend, take advantage of the trend, embrace innovation, intelligent upgrading, and promote the digital transformation work to go deeper and deeper, and strive to promote the iron and steel industry to achieve a deeper and higher level of digital transformation.
 

Du Xiaofang, general manager of Yongyang Special Steel Group, said that the current intelligent manufacturing has accelerated into the era of data-led, data and energy deep fusion of digital intelligence, data, arithmetic, artificial intelligence together constitute an important driving factor of the new quality of productivity, and Yongyang Special Steel has jointly built the first “5G+ fully-connected intelligent factory” in Hebei Province, realizing the integrated control of iron, steel and rolling and the visualization and fine management of the production process. University, Northeastern University, Beijing University of Science and Technology, Shanghai University and other domestic famous universities, jointly built the first “5G + fully connected intelligent factory” in Hebei Province, realizing the integration of iron-steel-rolling control and visualization of the production process, intelligent and refined management. In the future, Yongyang Special Steel will strengthen cooperation with China Unicom and academicians and professors, utilize the most cutting-edge digital technology, accelerate the integration and innovative application of new-generation information technology, such as big data, arithmetic network, artificial intelligence, etc., and comprehensively implement the “5G+, AI+”, “Situational Awareness”, “5G+, AI+”, “5G+, AI+” and “5G+, AI+”. Situational Awareness“, ”Vertical Modeling" and other areas of science and innovation, and make every effort to empower the development of new quality productivity with digital intelligence.
 

He Wei, deputy general manager of Hebei Unicom and head of China Unicom's Wisdom Steel Corps, said that as a centralized enterprise of the country, China Unicom's Wisdom Steel Corps, relying on the carrier's traditional resource endowment and years of technological precipitation in the areas of 5G private network, industrial PON network, cloud computing, etc., has provided services to more than 400 steel enterprises across the country, with the proportion of service enterprises accounting for more than 60% of the total number of steel enterprises. It has undertaken HSC Group's basic network coverage, Jingye Steel's 5G unmanned overhead crane, Yongyang Special Steel's 5G fully-connected intelligent factory, Jinxi Steel's intelligent transformation, and Baigong Steel's 5G intelligent steel fusion application, and other key steel enterprise information service projects in the province. In the next step, China Unicom Smart Steel Corps will, under the guidance of the provincial Department of Industry and Information Technology, strengthen the intensity of investment in R&D resources, and gradually undertake the engineering transformation of the core scientific and technological achievements of Academician Wang's team around the capacity of innovative development of the iron and steel industry, the optimization of the rolling process of the large model, and the management of iron and steel equipment of the entire process, so as to contribute to the digital transformation of the iron and steel industry of the province and the high-quality development of our own strength.
 

Hebei Province, the Office of Industry and Information Technology, second-level inspector Wang Hefu said steel is Hebei's pillar industry, digital transformation of Hebei iron and steel industry is not a “multiple choice”, is related to the survival and long-term development of the “mandatory” course. This year, HISCO Tangshan Steel and Shougang Jingtang was awarded the Hebei Province, “Digital Pilot” enterprises, Hebei Taihang Iron and Steel large model emerged, industrial PON, 5G, cloud services and other digital infrastructure continues to improve, digital application scenarios continue to enrich the iron and steel industry, the level of digitization is higher than the same industry in the country and the province's manufacturing industry. The next step, our office will introduce the steel industry's first provincial digital transformation standards, continue to organize docking diagnostics into the enterprise, and actively promote the digital transformation of the steel industry scene pilot, research and promotion of the steel industry artificial intelligence generative big model, to promote the digital transformation of steel enterprises, intelligent upgrading, digital transformation as an important support, and continue to stimulate the vitality of industrial innovation and development.
 

At the meeting, Hebei Province, the Office of Industry and Information Technology Steel Industry Division Director Zhang Xiaohui to do the recent work to do the interpretation. He said the iron and steel industry in the total amount of adjustment and structural adjustment process, clear direction of transformation and set up a high-quality development of confidence in the enterprise is crucial, the next step to seize the opportunity to do a good job together in five areas of work. First, seize the window period of financial support, the industry and credit departments and enterprises to work together for the transformation of financial and other financing policy support; second is to seize the key period of product transformation, the cities and counties of the industry and credit departments to grasp the bottom of the short-board products, the upstream and downstream cooperation between industry, academia and research to tackle the problem; third is to seize the breakthrough of the intelligent transformation, through the exploration of the promotion of artificial intelligence generative model, in-depth empowered by the whole process of iron and steel; fourth is to seize the basis of the green and low-carbon The fourth is to seize the foundation of green low-carbon, to continue to do a good job of carbon management infrastructure, core data reserves, and work together to promote the realization of the value of “Hebei Green Steel”; the fifth is to seize the key period of stable operation of the industry, to build the province's iron and steel industry supply chain platform, docking the key steel-using clusters, enterprises, and to ensure that the industry chain is smooth.
 

In the keynote report and iron and steel digital intelligence cutting-edge technology sharing session, academician Wang Guodong of Northeastern University, Prof. Zhang Denghua, Prof. Chu Mansheng, researcher Liu Shuchao, Associate Prof. Liu Xiaoming, Prof. Liu Zhenyu, Prof. Sun Jie, and Prof. Tang Shuai respectively to do technology sharing.
 

Academician Wang Guodong made a keynote report on “Deep Integration of Digital Economy and Real Economy, Promoting the Application of Generative AI in Iron and Steel Industry”. Academician Wang Guodong introduced in detail the new trend of the integration and development of the iron and steel industry with the digital economy, as well as the typical cases of generative AI application in the iron and steel industry. Academician Wang pointed out that the core competitiveness of the iron and steel industry lies in cracking the “black box” of the mainstream process, and by vigorously constructing the innovation infrastructure of iron and steel enterprises, promoting the development of “AI + industrial control” and generative AI + iron and steel, and realizing the development of intellectual change and digital transformation, digital change the brain, model replacement, build the steel all-process, integrated digital twin platform ROBOTSTEEL, to digitally empower the steel industry green, high-quality, strong chain, take the road of new industrialization, to create a new quality of steel productivity.
 

Professor Zhang Dianhua from Northeastern University gave an academic sharing on “Generative AI Enabling Steel Digital Transformation”.
 

Prof. Mansheng Chu of Northeastern University gave a lecture on “Intelligent Ironmaking Technology Driven by Data and Mechanism Fusion”.
 

Shuchao Liu, researcher from Northeastern University, gave a lecture on “Data-driven Modular Intelligent Steelmaking System for the Whole Process of Converter”.
 

Associate Professor Liu Xiaoming of Northeastern University made an academic sharing of “Digital Continuous Casting Key Equipment and Technology Development”.
 

Prof. Zhenyu Liu from Northeastern University gave a lecture on “Development and Application of Coupled Machine Learning Models for Plate and Strip Hot Rolling Processes”.
 

Professor Sun Jie from Northeastern University gave an academic sharing on Digital Modeling and Intelligent Optimization of Rolling Process.
 

Prof. Shuai Tang from Northeastern University gave a lecture on “Collaborative Quality Control Technology for Cold Rolled Low-Alloy Steel Based on Data-Mechanism Coupling Drive”.
 

Then Mr. Dai Ziwei, Director of Enterprise Management Department of Yongyang Special Steel, introduced the basic situation of Yongyang Special Steel and the practice and plan of digital transformation.
 

Digital transformation practice sharing by Li Hao, Senior Engineer of China Unicom's Smart Steel Army.
 

In the enterprise on-site research, Yongyang Special Steel combined with the actual situation of production and operation, by the director of each branch plant were introduced in Yongyang Special Steel in the steelmaking, ironmaking, rolling, power, equipment, production of general adjustments, technology centers and other links of the status quo, pain points and needs. Academician Wang Guodong team of Northeastern University affirmed the development of the enterprise, Wang Guodong academician said that the steel enterprises should be in the data collection, cleaning, classification based on the whole process of the iron and steel industry production data through the horizontal, through the artificial intelligence generative model, cracking the blast furnace, converter and rolling and other iron and steel production “black box”, to further enhance the innovation ability and production and smelting efficiency. Innovation ability and production and smelting efficiency, the “black box” into a “gold box”, really for the steel industry to create benefits, improve quality, reduce costs and reduce emissions. Academician team of experts for enterprise digital transformation related issues, a “point” a strategy, guidance, from artificial intelligence empowered enterprise production process optimization and enterprise technicians to carry out in-depth discussions and exchanges, and on related areas to reach cooperation intentions.
 

The success of this activity, for the academician team and key enterprises to communicate and exchange channels, is the government, industry, academia, research and gold synergistic linkage services to the iron and steel industry continued to new and better development of an important practice, opened the alliance to bring together high-end resources, together with the academician team in-depth enterprise, a new chapter in the service of the industry's innovation and development. As a next step, the alliance will continue to carry out docking activities in enterprises, and drive the digital transformation of the iron and steel industry in Hebei Province with advanced digital intelligence technology.