NANJING - China has built over 10,000 digital workshops and smart factories and become the world's largest intelligent manufacturing application market, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.

Xin Guobin, vice-minister of industry and information technology, revealed the data during his speech at the 2023 World Intelligent Manufacturing Conference held from Wednesday to Friday in Nanjing, capital of East China's Jiangsu province.

According to the official, intelligent manufacturing has increasingly become the key force that promotes the optimization of industrial systems and the transformation of the manufacturing mode.

In 2022 alone, the total value of supporting industries such as intelligent manufacturing equipment, industrial software, and system solutions in China exceeded 4 trillion yuan (about $559 billion), and the 5G technologies were applied in nearly 2,000 factories across the country, Xin noted.

Co-hosted by the Jiangsu provincial government, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, and the China Association for Science and Technology, this year's conference is themed on intelligent, digital, and connected transformation and digital-real economy integration and innovation.