A bird's-eye view of the Liyuan Economic and Technological Development Zone in Binhu, Wuxi. [Photo/WeChat account: benliucaijing]

The Liyuan Economic and Technological Development Zone, a provincial-level development zone established in 1992 in Binhu district, Wuxi, East China's Jiangsu province, has seen its industries grow by leaps and bounds over the past three decades.

In the late 1990s, the zone constructed 100,000 square meters of Wuxi's first five-story standard factories, which housed about 100 chipmakers, including Memsic Semiconductor and Wuxi ETEK Microelectronics Co, that have helped bolster the development of the city's integrated circuit (IC) sector.

The Liyuan development zone also worked with the Wuxi Research Institute of Applied Technology of Tsinghua University in 2012 to establish Jiangsu Maxscend Microelectronics Co, which is now listed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange and has a market value of more than 10 billion yuan ($1.5 billion).

In addition to the IC industry, the development zone has also been focusing on other high value-added emerging industries, such as industrial design, intelligent manufacturing and venture capital.

In light of the limited land in the zone, new buildings were built to attract companies in these sectors. In 2005, 500,000 square meters of standard factories and office building were put into use to house more than 400 enterprises including Japanese corporation Itochu, French company Danone, and Haier. The output per square meter of workshop in the zone was 35,000 yuan in 2005, the highest in Jiangsu.

Office buildings in the development zone are occupied by companies from all parts of the industrial chain. For example, the Lianchuang Building has more than 80 companies that specialize in different sections of the architecture industry, including design, construction, equipment installation services and real estate consulting.

Due to the good infrastructure and complete industrial chains, more and more corporate headquarters, sales companies, and research and development facilities have moved into the Liyuan development zone over the past years. The zone presently has over 3,400 enterprises, with about 60 percent of them involved in emerging sectors.

The zone is now aiming to expand its IC, intelligent manufacturing, high-end services and venture capital sectors into 10-billion-yuan industries by the end of 2025.