Trial production of 24 key projects was launched in the Guangzhou Development District and Guangzhou High-tech Zone on Sunday, helping accelerate economic activities amid the novel coronavirus pandemic.

The output value of the projects, ranging from new infrastructure, biological medicine and healthcare, advanced manufacturing and headquarters to other supporting industries, is expected to reach about 117.2 billion yuan ($16.5 billion) annually, according to the local government.

China Software CBD, a leading new infrastructure project with investment of 5 billion yuan, will develop into home of 500 software companies, according to Zhao Guangnan, general manager of SCI Group.

"The software CBD will become an import platform for information technology investments in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay area," said Zhao.

SCI Group is the investor in the China Software CBD project, which is China's first project focusing on research and development of blockchain technologies in the application areas of finance, supply chain, industrial internet and digital trading.

The local government has issued a series of incentive policies to accelerate development of new infrastructure and digital projects.

Also, nine foreign investment and joint-venture projects began trial production on Sunday.

"We will not simply expand the production capacity here in Guangzhou, but build optical lenses based on Industry 4.0 technologies," said Peng Wei, managing director of Zeiss Vision Care China.

The company began trial production in its optical manufacturing line in Guangzhou, which is the largest manufacturing base of high-end customized functional optic lenses and ophthalmic instruments of Zeiss, an international leading technology enterprises operating in the fields of optics and optoelectronics.