Shandong Inspur Huaguang Optoelectronics, a major epitaxial wafer producer in the zone, has successfully increased the quality of its products while controlling costs. The yield rate of its production line has risen to 98 percent, up from 80 percent in previous years.

"We have greater bargaining power thanks to the quality products we are putting on the market," said Wang Chengxin, deputy general manager of Inspur. "We have seen our order numbers increase annually."

Shengrui Transmission Co, the developer of the first frontengine, front-drive 8-gear auto transmission (8AT) in the zone, won the National Science and Technology Progress Award in January. The award is one of the top prizes devised by the State Council in recognition of scientific contributions made by both groups and individuals.

Shengrui launched the development of its 8AT project in 2006 and has developed a complete automatic transmission industrial chain. Construction work on the company's automotive transmission industrial park, which began in May 2016, is almost complete.

Shengrui marked a major milestone in November with the production of its 100,000th 8AT unit.

The company was capable of supplying 150,000 transmissions in 2016. It will boost its production capacity to 250,000 units in 2017.

The development zone, one of the first state-level economic zones in China, achieved outstanding business results in 2016.

The region ranked No 23 among 147 national-level economic development zones nationwide in terms of comprehensive development power in 2015, an improvement on its ranking of 25th in the previous year.

In 2016 the Weifang Hi-Tech Industrial Development Zone reached regional GDP of 39.54 billion yuan, an increase of 8.8 percent year-on-year.