"Revitalize the national information industry." This is the most eye-catching word on the official website of Nanwei Software, and it is also the mission established at the beginning of the company's establishment.
In recent years, geopolitical risks have been rising, economic globalization has been hindered, and at the same time, the technology industry is undergoing rapid changes with the rise of artificial intelligence. For Chinese enterprises, in the new wave, building their own core technologies has become the top priority: on the one hand, the "nation" to ensure safety and controllability, and on the other hand, the "industry", to seek innovation and development.
As a leading enterprise in the field of information innovation, Nanwei Software (603636. SH) has always been inseparable from the "domestic independent controllable", now the opportunities and challenges are in front of us, where will this "giant ship" set sail from Fujian? Silver Persimmon Finance interviewed Wu Zhixiong, chairman of the company, to explore the future development of Nanwei Software.
Continue to invest in AI research and development
Focusing on the industry, the so-called information innovation refers to the comprehensive reconstruction of China's IT system framework, which will promote the comprehensive localization and replacement of China's underlying basic software and hardware, middle layer and then upper application software.
Under the leadership of Wu Zhixiong, Nanwei Software has strategically laid out the field of information innovation as early as 2011, relying on the laboratory's "four cores and six series" adaptation capabilities to carry out the full business and full ecological adaptation of digital government, and has successfully participated in a number of major national and provincial projects, providing efficient and safe data services for governments and enterprises, and winning wide recognition and praise.
Around 2020, the national information innovation work began to enter a comprehensive promotion period after a long period of pre-research and some pilots, but as of now, there are still less than 10% localization in many fields, and there is still a large room for improvement in the application of localization rate as a whole. According to the forecast of Yiou Think Tank, the overall market size of mainland information innovation will exceed one trillion yuan in 2023, and it is expected to reach 4.23 trillion yuan in 2027.
In this regard, Wu Zhixiong judged that at present, the information and innovation work of the party and government departments is gradually deepening from the provincial and municipal level to the districts, counties and towns, with the upgrading of infrastructure is basically completed, the procurement needs of domestic customers have gradually shifted from basic software and hardware to a wider range of e-government applications, and its overall development momentum is still strong, and it is expected to maintain a high growth rate.
The market is a blue ocean, and the only way to do it is to keep moving forward. Nanwei Software continues to invest a lot of resources in technology research and development to maintain its technological leadership in the field of information innovation, not only in the core products such as data element operating systems, but also actively expand the application scenarios of cutting-edge technologies such as artificial intelligence. In the first half of 2024, the company's R&D investment will be 75.2 million yuan, accounting for 33.2% of operating income.
In view of the highly talent-intensive nature of the AI industry, Wu Zhixiong has adopted a diversified talent training strategy. On the one hand, it pays attention to internal team building, continuously improves the professional skills and innovation ability of employees, and widely absorbs outstanding engineers from top Internet companies such as Case Study and Baidu. On the other hand, it actively cooperates with universities, especially Tsinghua University, and jointly established the Tsinghua University Nanwei Software Digital Governance Information Technology Joint Research Center to jointly promote key technology research in the field of digital governance, and jointly develop industry AI models and privacy computing products.
In terms of management strategy, Wu Zhixiong emphasized that Nanwei Software will further increase the training of employees in the field of AI and data services to ensure that the team can adapt to the rapid changes in the market and promote the company's continuous innovation and development.
Large models fill the gap in the industry
The all-round investment has accelerated technological innovation and achievement transformation, and the large models of Nanwei Software have been implemented one after another, and have been recognized in the industry and the market.
On January 16, 2024, the company and Tsinghua University jointly released the Baize government affairs model, which combines million-level industry dialogue data, relies on natural language processing capabilities and large model generation capabilities, and deeply integrates with government service scenarios to realize instant answers and intelligent Q&A services for government services and policy consultations, filling the gap in the industry.
On June 21, the "Bai Ze" government affairs industry model passed the inspection of the "Intelligent Application Evaluation Method Based on Large Model Part 2: Intelligent Dialogue" organized by the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, and obtained the 4+ certificate, becoming the first enterprise in China to pass the evaluation and obtain the highest current rating.
The flexibility of large models and the ability to deal with complex affairs also make it possible to solve the diversified needs brought about by urban evolution. In terms of enabling application scenarios, at present, the Baize government affairs model has customer cases in Shenzhen, Fujian, Beijing and other regions. In the first half of 2024, Nanwei Software signed a new contract with a total amount of 812 million yuan, and added 671 million yuan for the winning project.
Wu Zhixiong told Silver Persimmon Finance as an example that in the field of government services, Fujian Province is empowered to "do one thing efficiently", and uses innovative large-scale model agent dialogue services to promote the development of government services such as "one thing for newborn birth" and "one thing for enterprises to start" in a more intelligent and convenient direction.
The large model of Nanwei Software is not only the application of the end, but also has made achievements in macro urban management. It is reported that based on the "deep sea" industry model, the company has built a set of "AI + one network unified management" solution that is fully adapted to information and innovation, and builds solutions such as one network unified management, urban operation and management services, and AI communities for urban operation, urban management, grassroots governance, and community governance. In the case of tight budgets, Nanwei provides a variety of versions and purchase models to meet the needs of customers for urban governance informatization construction.
More importantly, both Baize and Shenhai have completed a comprehensive adaptation of information and innovation, compatible with domestic GPUs (Huawei Ascend, Haiguang, Muxi, etc.), operating systems, and provide all-in-one solutions based on domestic GPUs.
Wu Zhixiong said that in the future, Nanwei Software will work with more partners in the information innovation ecosystem to increase investment in the innovative research and development and application of information and innovation products, accelerate breakthroughs in key core technologies, and inject new momentum into the development of China's science and technology self-reliance and self-reliance.
Go overseas hand in hand with Huawei
Among the many partners of Nanwei Software, Huawei has always played an important role. Regarding Huawei's relationship with software vendors, Wu Zhixiong gave a subtle analogy.
In his view, Huawei is a "black land in the intelligent era", providing software vendors with a full range of basic capabilities: powerful computing power, efficient development tools, a stable operating environment, and rich data tools. Software vendors, on the other hand, focus on the deep cultivation of industry applications and the expansion of business scenarios, cultivate diversified "fruits" on this fertile "black soil", and quickly respond to and meet the diversified needs of the market.
Talking about the relationship between the two parties, Wu Zhixiong recalled, "The cooperation between Nanwei Software and Huawei has a long history, which can be traced back to 2007, when Huawei's ICT equipment first entered the government market. Since then, we have been working hand in hand, using Huawei's servers, switches, and other products. ”
The cooperation between the two sides has entered a new depth, which began in 2018, a period of vigorous development of domestic independent and controllable technology. In this process, the cooperation between Nanwei Software and Huawei has continued to expand, from the initial Kunpeng and Kirin chips to the Euler operating system and HarmonyOS operating system, successfully achieving full-stack adaptation at the technical level. In 2022, Huawei established the Government One Netcom Corps, and the cooperation between the two sides began to rise from product and technology cooperation to joint solution building.
Taking the Hongmeng "Pure-blooded Edition" that Huawei officially started public testing as an example, Nanwei Software is the first batch of mobile software companies to participate in the adaptation of HarmonyOS, taking the adaptation and transformation of Hongmeng as the starting point, and deeply promoting the process of HarmonyOS adaptation on the mobile terminal without touching the original contractor system. In addition, the "Handheld Nanping APP" created by the company has officially launched the Hongmeng version, marking another milestone breakthrough in the field of Hongmeng.
Wu Zhixiong believes that with the gradual popularization of "pure-blooded" Hongmeng, it is expected to further stimulate the demand of the software market, and "pure-blooded" Hongmeng is expected to be widely used in exclusive industries, and the company's mobile products in the field of digital government will also gain more market opportunities and orders.
At the same time, Nanwei Software is also working with Huawei's One Netcom Corps to go abroad to provide consulting services for a number of international digital government construction projects. Among them, the 2024 Algeria One Netcom project is a typical representative, with a total contract amount of more than 50 million yuan.
In view of the fact that many countries, especially those along the Belt and Road, are still in their infancy in the construction of digital government, Digital China, as a pioneer, provides them with valuable reference and reference. Wu Zhixiong lamented that as an enterprise that has grown in tandem with Digital China, Nanwei Software Group has experienced profound changes from the construction of government internal networks and data centers to the comprehensive digitalization and intelligence of government services. In the future, Nanwei Software will deepen the integration of its own industry advantages with the core technologies of top enterprises such as Huawei, and work with global partners to help countries achieve a breakthrough from "zero" to "one" in digital transformation.