Dr. Gong Zheng from the Micro-Nano Automation Institute: Take root in the new high-speed rail city and put "eyes" on traditional manipulators
On February 7, 2018, the first R&D industrial park jointly established by Jiangsu Industrial Technology Research Institute and the local government-the first batch of projects in the Yangtze River Delta International R&D Community held a signing ceremony in Suzhou High-speed Rail New City. Jiangsu Industrial Technology Research Institute Micro Nano Automation System and Equipment Technology Research Institute Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Micro-Nano Automation Institute) is one of the first batch of contracted projects.
In April of that year, the Micronano Automation Institute officially settled in the start-up area of the Yangtze River Delta International R&D Community. Within a few months of its establishment, the company has absorbed a highly sophisticated team of 15 Ph.Ds and dozens of graduate students from global "double-hundred" colleges and universities. The first batch of six industrialization projects has successfully connected with industrial application customers such as Suning, Cobos, Weapon Group, JD.com, Yutong, etc., involving application fields such as automobile manufacturing, logistics, rehabilitation, and high-end scientific research.
Nowadays, the Micro-Nano Automation Institute, which has been settled in Suzhou High-speed Rail New City for more than a year, is expanding its staff and has successively introduced many new projects including micro-medicine. The company's core member and project manager Gong Zheng said that for the future, he and the team have very clear goals: "We plan to be at least the top three in the country in a certain field of the machine vision industry within three years."
Gong Zheng
Project Manager, Micro-Nano Automation System and Equipment Technology Research Institute Co., Ltd., Jiangsu Industrial Technology Research Institute
Core member of Jiangsu "Double Innovation Team" in 2019
Awarded Young Researcher of Jiangsu Industrial Technology Research Institute in 2018
Core member of "Key Entrepreneurship Team" of Yangcheng Lake Science and Technology Leading Talents Program in 2018
Core member of the "Major Entrepreneurship Team" of Huanxiu Lake Innovation and Entrepreneurship Talent Plan in 2019
PhD in Mechanical Physics Engineering, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Japan
Master of Computer Science, Zhejiang University
1 PCT international patent, 4 invention patents, 4 utility model patents
Worked for AON, a Fortune 500 company
With entrepreneurial ideals in mind, he returned to China to join the machine vision industry
Gong Zheng, who likes to ridicule that he is a "code farmer", has been engaged in computer research since he was a child. He clearly remembers that he had his first computer in the second year of junior high. After many years, the computer did not leave his life and work:
"From undergraduate and graduate students, to studying abroad for Ph.D. and post-doctoral studies, I have always chosen computer research. Later, I found that computer vision has a very broad application prospect in the domestic machine vision industry. Later, when applied to the machine vision industry, while serving enterprises, it can also realize their entrepreneurial ideals."
In 2018, Gongzheng, who has been in foreign countries for many years, returned to China and joined the Micro-Nano Automation Institute with two other core members after many inspections.
The business scope of Micro-Nano Automation is mainly oriented to the fields of biomedicine, high-end equipment, new energy, new materials, new generation information technology, etc., with key industry technologies such as micro-nano control, micro-nano processing and micro-nano measurement as the research and development direction, and develop series Micro-nano automated instruments and equipment can realize precise operation, processing, ultra-high-precision measurement and precision manufacturing of micro-nano-scale objects.
Gong Zheng said that in all micro-nano automation departments in several research directions and industrialization, his department is mainly aimed at the industrial application of machine vision. There are three core members, each of whom performs their duties, and has a clear division of labor-the core members of the "strong-strong alliance"
Gong Zheng is mainly responsible for software and algorithm work. Among the other two members: one is a postdoctoral fellow from the University of Toronto. He came to Suzhou to start a business with him in 2018. Currently, he is mainly responsible for the hardware and algorithm direction. The other one is very familiar with the domestic machine vision industry market, responsible for market applications and product checks.
In Gongzheng's view, such a team combination can be described as a "strong combination": "We have rich experience in visual algorithms as well as considerable experience in the industry."
Gong Zheng gave a simple example to explain the application principle of machine vision: "It is equivalent to putting an eye on a traditional manipulator to make it more intelligent. Without a vision system, one can imagine that the manipulator is a flexible "blind man". After this vision system, it can do a lot of things that it could not do before."
At present, Asia's first "high-speed and high-precision 3D visual real-time flexible inspection system" developed by his team with nano-level precise positioning, inspection and operation capabilities has been put into market application.
Gong Zheng revealed that the successful development of this product is of great significance. Because before this, similar systems can only recognize millimeter-level errors in two-dimensional space, while this system can recognize micrometer-level (0.1 mm) errors in three-dimensional space: "It bridges the gap between manual and visionless robotic arm operations. , Making the traditional robotic arm smarter, and at the same time it can replace the current manual operation."
From "pure scientific research workers" to "technical sales"
In addition to the projects that have been put into production, many products of the Micro-Nano Automation Institute are currently in the production stage of non-standard equipment. Working overtime and staying up late has become a daily "compulsory course" for Gong Zheng and team members.
However, when talking about the most impressive thing in the entrepreneurial process, Gong Zheng said frankly that working overtime and staying up late is not a problem. The biggest challenge he faces is from a scientific researcher to a professional technical sales. Role conversion:
"In the past, doing research was to explore purely academic issues, thinking about how to do a good job in the experiment, and writing the article, it was relatively simple. After starting a business, we need to go out and communicate with customers and make the products we develop To promote it, this kind of role change requires me to adapt slowly."
Since the beginning of this year, more and more "technical sales" personnel have joined the Micronano Automation Institute, and some new projects have been introduced one after another. The "online three-coordinates" project being developed by Gong Zhenghe's team is one of the new projects, mainly used in the detection of new energy vehicle battery cases.
For the future market application of this project, Gongzheng is very confident: "Traditional three-coordinates, when it is necessary to detect a huge battery case with a size of 2.5 meters x 1.6 meters, it takes 4 hours to detect a product. We launched This product only needs to be tested within 8 minutes, and its accuracy can fully meet the needs of customers."
Rooted in Suzhou, serving the automation industry
Gong is a native of Xi'an. Since graduating from postgraduate in 2007, he has been studying, working and living abroad. It was only last year that he resolutely left everything abroad and returned to China for development.
He has two children in Canada, one is 6 years old and the other has just turned 1. Only during the winter and summer vacations each year does the wife have time to take the children back to China to visit relatives.
Gong Zheng joked that although he was separated from his wife and children for a long time, his wife still gave him "at least superficial full support" for his decision to return to China to start a business.
In Gong Zheng's view, he has read so many years of books not just to find a job and live a stable life. He always felt that his energy could return home to do more meaningful things.
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"At the time I chose to come to Suzhou, one of the most important reasons is that many of our customers are in Suzhou. In the year of settlement, in addition to having more frequent interactions with customers, the relevant government departments of Xiangcheng District and the high-speed rail new city have been in the office space. , Funding, talent applications and other aspects have given us enough support, which is also very important to us." Gong Zheng said that these are the reasons why he insisted on staying in Suzhou.
In more than a year in Suzhou, many places have left the footprints of Gong Zheng. He said that he likes Suzhou and Xiangcheng. After his career is stable, he plans to bring his wife and children here.
In his future plan-within three years, to lead the team in a certain field of the machine vision industry to be the top three in the national industry: "I will be rooted in this land and realize my dreams while also contributing to the Suzhou Automation Company. Contribute to the realization of industrial upgrading."
