The Flanders-China Chamber of Commerce organized an insightful webinar on R&D and Engineering in China on 25 March 2025 where industry leaders shared their experiences and best practices.
Ms. Gwenn Sonck, Executive Director, Flanders-China Chamber of Commerce, welcomed the participants and introduced the speakers. China has established itself as a global leader in many areas of innovation, particularly in artificial intelligence (AI) and electric vehicles (EVs). Many of our companies are now operating in China for China. Driven by the size of the market, the strength of the local supply chain and the country's innovative capacity.
To succeed in the fast-changing environment it is essential that our business leaders embrace adaptability and visionary thinking. These are the kind of leaders that are joining us on our innovation trip to China from May 25 to 31. The Province of West-Flanders and the Flanders-China Chamber of Commerce are organizing this innovation trip to Hangzhou and Shanghai. Hangzhou has been named as one of the most innovative cities in China. We all heard about AI start-up DeepSeek, Alibaba, Geely and Unitree, which are all based in Hangzhou. The goal of this mission is to learn from China's innovation and explore potential opportunities for collaboration. In Shanghai we will exchange experiences with Flemish companies and also visit Chinese companies. The only way to understand China's innovation is by experiencing it first-hand.
Yves Van Rompaey, Senior Vice President, Corporate Research & Development, Umicore, talked about his experiences in China. Umicore transforms metals into material solutions through chemistry, material science and metallurgy, and recycles the material solutions. The biggest areas of Umicore's expertise are in battery materials, catalysis, recycling and specialty materials. Umicore is active from the mines to the end user. It is a global supplier, active in 29 countries over five continents. Most of revenue is generated by clean mobility and recycling, and most of the input materials are secondary and end-of-life materials. Umicore has eight production sites, seven commercial offices and one regional head office in Greater China. Automotive catalysts is a very big activity and we do the design of our catalysts there, being one of the market leaders in China.
Keys to Umicore's success in China is co-development with customers; collaboration with local universities and research institutes; and adapting quickly to local market needs. A new fuel cell catalysis plant is under construction close to Shanghai, which should be ready in 2026. We are creating one R&D footprint to connect all our activities. A big driver is the growth of EVs. We also see a big growth in battery recycling. There is an incredibly fast development in AI and the use of these applications in different areas. Umicore is setting up a new innovation center in Shanghai to tap into the eco-system and have access to local top talent. The planned activities are fuel cell and recycling labs, and computational science and digitalization teams.
Kristof Roelstraete, R&D Manager, Picanol gave a presentation about “Engineering Experiences in China”. Picanol is part of the industrial Tessenderlo Group, which has five operating segments: agro; bio-valorization; industrial solutions; machines & technologies; and T-power. The Picanol Group is active in the machines & technologies segment. The Picanol Group is composed of Picanol; Proferro; Psicontrol and Melotte. The group has four production units with around 2,100 employees and €622.4 million revenue in 2023. Picanol set up its first production plant for weaving machines in China in 1994. It has a turnover of €420 million and is one of the most innovative players, producing the fastest rapier and airjet weaving machine in the world. Production plants are located in Ieper and Suzhou. Around 2,600 weaving mills across the world are using Picanol machines.
Picanol has R&D and test facilities in Ieper and Suzhou. High-end products are manufactured in Ieper and mid-end products for the Chinese market in Suzhou. Reengineering for the local market was needed because supplies could not immediately be sourced in China. Technologies were adapted to the local supply chain. Some material specs were modified to local norms and availability. In the meantime the same performance and quality is achieved in Suzhou as in Ieper and we are moving from re-engineering towards co-design and global sourcing. Critical components are still delivered from Ieper.
On intellectual property rights we have no illusions, there are eight copies of our previous model. Infringement of “internal” invention patents are difficult to detect and to proof so you need to be one step ahead. Design patents are very useful. The main leak of IPR is not with our employees but with the suppliers. Chinese patent applications are a big issue. They are bypassing original patents, are very distracting and require a lot of monitoring. For example the design of the push buttons was copied. Doing R&D in China is necessary because of the local eco-system of customers and suppliers; to move from pure re-engineering to co-design; and because of tax incentives in the Suzhou Industrial Park. We do not share all our know-how.
A Q&A session concluded the webinar. Q.: Is there a positive evolution in the enforcement of IP? Mr. Roelstraete: We have a good experience. Of course we were copied many times, but we won all our cases. The most important point is to be one step ahead as the quality of the copies is improving. Q.: Do you see the need to use robots? Mr. Van Rompaey: We start to buy more and more equipment in China – not necessarily robots – because the quality and price is good. Mr. Roelstraete: We don't have the intention yet to use humanoid robots in our assembly, but some of our customers are starting to use robots due to difficulties finding people. Q.: What are the advantages in doing R&D in China? Mr. Van Rompaey: It is critically important to be close to our customers. The advantages are that the eco-system is moving fast and new equipment is becoming available really fast. The eagerness of suppliers to co-develop is also an advantage.
