Innovation move from strategy to implementation：Sinotrans work hand in hand with Plug and Play China to hold the Innovation Salon

Technology changes logistics. This ancient and long-standing industry is undergoing rapid changes.

From the era of “Slow Transportation” to today’s 7x24 hour global network, to unmanned vehicle transportation, supply chain and big data, the logistics industry has moved towards digitalization and intelligence.

Sinotrans Holdings Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to Sinotrans) is a leading comprehensive logistics service provider in the industry and a unified operation platform and unified brand for China Merchants Group logistics businesses. And it is also a trendsetter in this technological change.

On October 15, the second “Sinotrans X Plug and Play Innovation Salon” was held in Beijing.

With the leaders of regional companies, professional companies and functional departments of its headquarter, Sinotrans entered the Beijing headquarters of Plug and Play China to discuss the innovation trend of the logistics industry together with innovation experts, university scholars and technology entrepreneurs.

Leaders from both sides including Xiang Gao, Chief Digital Officer of Sinotrans, Chen Zhao, Executive Vice President and Managing Partner of Plug and Play China, Zhiying Jin, Vice President and Cluster Leader Plug and Play China have joined this Salon.

In March this year, Sinotrans and Plug and Play China have successfully held an Innovation Salon. In the previous successful experience, the Innovation Salon further improved the form and content of communication in order to inspire more innovation ideas and accelerating the implementation of innovation.

Xiang Gao, Chief Digital Officer of Sinotrans mentioned in the welcome speech: “The prospect of digital transformation of logistics industry is very good. Sinotrans has made a lot of investment and attempts in the field of new technology, and has also produced many achievements. Digital innovation not only requires us to build our own technical capabilities, but also requires us to cooperate with other enterprises in innovation. There are many overlaps between our business and Plug and Play at both ends of corporates and startups. We hope to build a long-term development space together with Plug and Play in the future.”

Speech delivered by Xiang Gao, Chief Digital Officer of Sinotrans

Chen Zhao, Executive Vice President and Managing Partner of Plug and Play China, introduced the current environment of entrepreneurship in China, which surprised the guests at the site.

He mentioned: “At present, entrepreneurial enthusiasm is very high, from college students, scientists to business executives.” Taking the 5th China College Students Internet Plus Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition as an example, the number of enrollment teams received this year exceeds the total of the previous four years. This phenomenon also confirms Plug and Play China’s view that “Now is an era of entrepreneurial economy”. Plug and play China is willing to join hands with Sinotrans to participate in and build China’s innovation ecosystem.”

Speech delivered by Chen Zhao, Executive Vice President and Managing Partner of Plug and Play China

▎Innovation insight sharing: from strategy to implementation

Now, we are in an era of entrepreneurial economy. Innovation not only belongs to startups, large enterprises are also actively cooperating with startups to provide blood for themselves and promote business transformation and upgrading.

In this salon, three specially invited guests shared the trend and insight of innovation from different perspectives.

Professor Yangfeng Cao, President of Institute of Innovation Ecosystem of Plug and Play Chin, delivered a keynote speech on enterprise transformation strategy. Professor Cao quoted several Top 500 enterprises’ actual practice cases, shared the achievements based on more than ten years’ research, explained the pain points, directions and ways of enterprise transformation in a simple way, and triggered a warm discussion among the guests on site.

Keynote speech by Professor Yangfeng Cao

Jizhen Li, Deputy Head of School of Economics and Management of Tsinghua University, shared how to achieve innovations in the digital era. President Li pointed out that the competition in the digital era is not a war of differentiation, but a network war with platform / ecosystem as the intermediary. Both enterprises and individuals pursue interaction and win-win results. With the help of the innovation examples of famous enterprises and universities, President Li explained the innovation modes of different types of organizations in the digital era.

Keynote speech by Professor Jizhen Li

Lei Lin, a professor with PhD of School of Economics and Management, Tsinghua University, shared the path of innovation from the perspective of internal enterprises. Dr. Lin introduced the concept of “Internal Entrepreneurship”, and explained to the guests how to stimulate the vitality of employees from the framework, system, culture and other aspects with the help of the cases of many well-known enterprises in the industry, so as to help enterprises build an internal entrepreneurship system so that individuals and enterprises can share achievements and make progress together.

Keynote speech by Dr. Lin

▎Technological Products Release and Innovation Technology Docking

Theoretical research and trend analysis are “looking up at the starry sky” and innovation application is “do solid works”. Both are indispensable. One of the highlights of the salon is the release of Sinotrans’s technological products.

Sinotrans has always been committed to building a world-class intelligent logistics platform to continuously create business and social values with the best solutions and services. Sinotrans has always encouraged and supported technological innovation and created many products with advanced technology.

During the activity, Sinotrans released a number of technological innovation products including RPA solution, intelligent algorithm solution, shared warehouse solution, intelligent processing platform for foreign trade documents. Besides, the relevant business leaders also introduced Sinotrans’s warehouse automation R&D strategy to the guests.

These products will empower Sinotrans business and improve the level of providing services for users. Meanwhile, Sinotrans will also play its leading role as an industry leader, continuously promote the implementation and application of cutting-edge technologies in the logistics and supply chain industries, improve the efficiency of the whole industry, and accelerate the industry reform.

Six startups including Whole Link Technology, Youhualin, Tsingh Tech, Guozi Robotics, Data Grand, XYZ Robotics also attended the Salon and introduced their technology products to the business leaders of Sinotrans.

Startups participating in the roadshows

The companies participated in this roadshow cover startups from early stages to growing stage, and their technologies involve robots, automation, SaaS platform and other directions. These startups are carefully selected by Sinotrans and Plug and Play China’s Supply Chain and Logistics team. Based on the actual needs of various business departments of Sinotrans, they are dedicated to carry out in-depth exchanges and docking in this salon in order to achieve cooperation in the future.

▎Embrace innovation, embrace the future

From storage, transportation to delivery, the logistics industry reflects and promotes the concept of “global interconnection”. With the implementation of Robotics, Big Data, Cloud Computing, Machine Vision and other technologies in the logistics industry, every link of logistics is innovating and creating at a visible speed, providing greater convenience for users.

Such innovation is inseparable from the joint efforts of large enterprises, entrepreneurs, platform institutions and other parties. Plug and Play is just the builder of a professional supply chain logistics innovation platform. It is founded in Silicon Valley and has offices in Berlin, Shanghai and Singapore. The Plug and Play Supply Chain and Logistics team provides one-stop solutions for large enterprises and a global stage for startups.

Many a little make a mickle. When more and more innovation pioneers work together to create an ecosystem of logistics innovation, the future of the industry is bound to come sooner.