Business representatives and local officials attend a project-signing ceremony at the Jinyang Lake Digital Economy Development Summit. [Photo by Shi Xiaobo for China Daily]

The North China province of Shanxi is welcoming a new boom of investment in the digital economy sector, organizers of the 2022 Jinyang Lake Digital Economy Development Summit announced recently.

The summit, held from Aug 18-20, saw the signing of agreements for 154 projects in the digital economy sector, with combined pledged investment totaling 93.62 billion yuan ($13.65 billion). A number of breakthrough achievements in research and development were also announced during the three-day event, according to the organizers.

Previously called Jinyang Lake Integrated Circuits and Software Industries Summit, the event entered its third edition this year.

Participants in the summit said they viewed this event as a showcase of the fruitful development of Shanxi's digital economy and a gateway to new business opportunities.

Gai Longjia, co-president and chief operating officer of software developer Neusoft, which is based in Shenyang, capital city of Liaoning province, said his company has been a "loyal participant" in the summit in the last three years and its interest in the event is stimulated by the huge market potential in Shanxi.

"Shanxi has rich application scenarios and a beneficial ecosystem for the digital economy," Gai said. "There are huge demands for digital technologies and solutions for its economic transformation, especially in the areas of intelligent mining, e-government, smart healthcare and industrial digitalization."

Shanxi is implementing an economic transformation campaign that aims to upgrade its coal-mining and resource-consuming industries and foster emerging industries as new growth drivers.

An exhibition at the Jinyang Lake summit showcases Shanxi's latest development in the digital economy. [Photo by Liu Tong for China Daily]

The digital economy is regarded by local authorities as one of the leading, strategic emerging industries as it is playing a significant role in upgrading Shanxi's multiple industries, improving government administration and changing people's lifestyles.

In 2021, the total operational revenue of Shanxi's core industries in the digital economy was 200 billion yuan, accounting for nearly 10 percent of the provincial GDP, according to the Shanxi Statistics Bureau.

A number of new R&D institutions, including the Taiyuan-Xinzhou data traffic research lab, a national-level public service platform for artificial intelligence and the smart mining labs of Huawei and China Unicom, announced their operations during the event. Local officials said these R&D facilities will inject new energy into Shanxi's high-quality, sustained development.

Shanxi's new achievements in digital-driven development were announced during the summit.

One eye-catching area in the use of digital technologies is the coal-mining sector. Statistics show that a total of 23 smart coal mines and 572 intelligent mining shafts have been developed in Shanxi in recent years, which means that more than 70 percent of the province's coal output are produced by advanced, digitalized facilities.

Digital technologies have also contributed to improving governments' administrative efficiency. In Shanxi, more than 90 percent of the administrative service procedures can now be handled online, according to officials.

Jin Shuaini contributed to this story.