Cedrik Neike , CEO of Siemens Digital Industries, traded his suit for workwear at Nanjing’s Lighthouse Factory. He got hands-on with AI-guided assembly and watched production lines reconfigure as easily as Lego.
Not a simulation. Not a demo. This is the factory of tomorrow — live, right now.
Come with Cedrik, and see how industrial AI is bringing smart manufacturing to life.
Siemens’ partnership with Nanjing spans more than a century. In 1922, Siemens supplied electrical equipment to a cement plant in Nanjing. In 1996, Siemens Numerical Control (Nanjing) Co., Ltd. was founded, marking the launch of its manufacturing footprint in the city. Over the nearly three decades since then, Siemens has kept scaling up its investments and gradually built a complete local value chain covering R&D, manufacturing, sales and services in Nanjing.
Up to now, Siemens operates one innovation empowerment center, one business headquarters, two manufacturing plants, two R&D centers and four branch offices in Nanjing, together with an ecosystem of over 400 local suppliers.
Siemens Power Automation Co., Ltd., located in Jiangning Development Zone, was established in 2004. It serves as a key regional headquarters of Siemens Power Automation outside Germany, registering an output value of 543 million yuan in 2025.
Siemens Numerical Control (Nanjing) Co., Ltd. in Lishui Development Zone covers a land area of 176 mu with a total investment of 800 million yuan. Construction started in 2019 and the plant went into operation in 2021. It mainly produces numerical control systems, general-purpose inverters, servo motors and other products, achieving an output value of 4.677 billion yuan in 2025.
Also based in Lishui, the Siemens Motion Control R&D Center was put into operation in 2023 with a total investment of 600 million yuan and 400 R&D personnel on staff. Its revenue exceeded 300 million yuan in 2025.
The Siemens Xcelerator Yangtze River Delta Innovation Empowerment Center, signed to settle in Xuanwu District in September 2024, was officially inaugurated in December 2025, attracting five ecosystem enterprises to register and set up operations here.
Evolving from an electrical equipment supplier a hundred years ago to a major manufacturing hub housing regional headquarters, R&D centers and a Lighthouse Factory, Siemens continues to expand its investment landscape in Nanjing. It stands as a prime example of deep integration between multinational corporations and host cities.
