By Liu Shi’an, Shen Wenmin, People’s Daily
Inside a circular synchrotron over seven meters in diameter, proton beams raced around the track at increasing speeds. After millions of revolutions, reaching about 2/3 the speed of light, the beam was channeled through a high-energy transport line into a treatment room, precisely targeting a patient’s tumor for a focused, “surgical strike” on cancer cells. This is a glimpse inside the assembly and testing operations at Shanghai APACTRON Particle Equipment Co., Ltd. (APACTRON) in Shanghai’s Jiading district.
“A proton therapy system consists of 27 subsystems and spans fields from accelerator physics to electronics, electrical engineering, control systems, mechanics, and software. It is one of the largest and most sophisticated medical devices in the world,” said Zhang Manzhou, chief engineer of APACTRON.
Following a decade of dedicated R&D, the company’s project team has mastered the full technology chain from design and key components to system integration and debugging, and has secured 62 authorized patents. Over 85 percent of components of China’s first domestically produced proton therapy system were locally manufactured, and this number is expected to reach 100 for the second one.
In 2025, Shanghai makes the cultivation of new quality productive forces its core development strategy. The city will simultaneously advance three key fronts: nurturing and expanding leading-edge industries, upgrading traditional sectors, and laying the groundwork for future industries. The focus will be on achieving high-end, intelligent, green, and integrated development to drive a comprehensive transformation and modernization of the industrial landscape.
According to Zhang Ying, director of the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Economy and Informatization, the city will implementpolicy measures this year to reform the innovation ecosystem for industry, expand the supply of high-quality industrial technologies, and launch a new industrial standards initiative.
Efforts will also be made to cultivate a diverse range of innovation-driven enterprises and develop future industrial tracks, aiming to create competitive, next-generation products such as low-altitude intelligent equipment, humanoid robots, and 6G technologies.
On February 6, at the embodied artificial intelligence training ground of the National and Local Co-Built Humanoid Robotics Innovation Center in Zhangjiang, Shanghai, over 100 heterogeneous humanoid robots were being trained in a variety of technical applications, including 3C electronics manufacturing and automotive inspection.
Xu Bin, the center’s general manager, said the training facility is expected to build an embodied artificial intelligence corpus of over 10 million high-quality physical data entries by the end of this year, laying the foundation for a robust embodied intelligence platform.
Since the beginning of 2025, Shanghai has been intensifying efforts under its “artificial intelligence +” initiative to promote the application of the technology across key sectors, providing accessible, high-quality, and inclusive public services for all types of innovators.
To promote sustainable and more integrated industrial development, Shanghai is accelerating the construction of green factories and zero-carbon industrial parks, while fostering specialized clusters of production-oriented service industries.
Recently, Toyota announced the establishment of a new company in Shanghai’s Jinshan district to develop and manufacture Lexus-branded electric vehicles and batteries. It marked the first time Lexus vehicles will be produced locally in China, further strengthens Shanghai’s position as a leading hub for new energy vehicles.
To address the growing demand for green development from enterprises, Shanghai has completed 6.68 billion kilowatt-hours of interprovincial and intra-city green electricity transactions this year, setting a new record and continuing a four-year streak of rapid growth.
