The county level city of Zhangjiagang has taken the lead in the country in exploring the "Enterprise Science and Technology Innovation Bonus Point System" by giving full play to reforming the science and technology system, stimulating the energy of enterprise science and technology innovation, and strengthening the dominant position of enterprise science and technology innovation.
At the Shagang Iron and Steel Research Institute located in Zhangjiagang, Yang Hao, an engineer, is leading his team to conduct strength tests on ultra-high strength bridge steel.
The new type of steel they have developed has a 40% increase in strength compared to the past, and has been successfully applied in the construction of the Daduhe Bridge on the Sichuan-Tibet Railway.
In recent years, the continuous increase in various innovative achievements of Shagang Group is inseparable from the guidance and support adopted by Zhangjiagang City through the "enterprise innovation bonus point system".
The more innovative achievements and patented technologies a company has, the higher its innovation points will be. Every year, Shagang exchanges bonus points into subsidy funds, talent subsidies, and other "dividends" to reward its R&D personnel so as to greatly mobilize employees' innovation enthusiasm and promote the formation of a strong innovation atmosphere within the enterprise.
As one of the first batch of innovative county-level cities in China, Zhangjiagang has always attached great importance to scientific and technological innovation.
However, in the past, Zhangjiagang faced the problem of dispersed innovation resources and low administrative service efficiency in the technology management department.
In order to improve the level of technology management at the grassroots level, Zhangjiagang has implemented technology innovation bonus point management system, which consolidates and integrates innovation resources originally scattered in multiple departments such as development and reform, science and technology, and industry and information technology, scores the enterprise’s R&D investment, talent projects, and intellectual property one by one, and unifies the scattered policy support into "point-based dividends" so as to maximize the utilization of resources such as financial support, talent settlement, children's enrollment, guaranteed housing, and credit investment, which has not only effectively improved the efficiency of financial fund utilization, but also simplified the formalities for business procedures.
“After implementing the integration of innovation bonus points, we do not need to seek approval from various government departments, but rather coordinate on a platform to achieve rapid processing”, Wang Chao, Dean of the Research Institute of Jiangsu Guofu Hydrogen Energy Technology Equipment Co., Ltd., said.
The technology innovation bonus point system has also become a "unified examination paper" for measuring the level of local enterprise technology innovation. Accurately testing and profiling the innovation level of enterprises is not only beneficial for benchmarking and improving their technological innovation capabilities, but also for the government to accurately identify a group of high growth small and medium-sized enterprises.
“We have developed the Enterprise Innovation Activity Index, developed a total ranking list and an industry chain sub-ranking list, and used top- ranked technology enterprises as the ‘golden seeds’ for cultivating high tech, gazelle, and unicorn enterprises, creating a ‘hierarchical matrix’ for technology enterprises”, Zhu Chenyang, Deputy Director of Science and Technology Bureau, Zhangjiagang, said.
Nearly 8000 enterprises in Zhangjiagang have received innovation bonus points of over 500 thousand points and distributed support funds of over 900 million yuan.
Zhangjiagang has upgraded the enterprise innovation bonus point system by taking the lead in the province in implementing the "credit system" management of industrial support policies, increasing support for the development of industrial innovation clusters in terms of contribution incentives, industrial investment, and innovation investment, further integrating innovation resources, and providing strong innovation support for industrial transformation and upgrading as well as high-quality economic and social development.
