Harnessing Cycles: The Evolution of Specialized “Little Giants” in Shanghai’s High-Tech Landscape

The Power of Transcending Cycles: Validating the Evolution Logic of “Specialized, Refined, Unique, and New” “Little Giants” in the “Double High Grounds”

On January 16, 2026, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology released the latest revised “Measures for the Gradual Cultivation Management of High-Quality Small and Medium Enterprises.” These measures broaden the cultivation foundation by incorporating technology-driven small and medium enterprises into the cultivation framework for the first time. They also refine the criteria for recognizing specialized, refined, unique, and new small and medium enterprises, as well as “Little Giants.” The goal of these measures is to better leverage exemplary small and medium enterprises to strengthen foundational enterprises and promote a more scientific and standardized cultivation process, thereby enhancing the prestigious brand of specialized and refined enterprises. This institutional upgrade accurately addresses the intrinsic needs arising from the current evolution of industrial hierarchies. During this critical transition from “expanding quantity” to “strengthening quality,” the industrial leverage effect of “Little Giants” becomes particularly evident.

Data shows that China has cultivated over 17,600 specialized, refined, unique, and new “Little Giants,” which, despite comprising only 3.5% of the country’s industrial small and medium enterprises, contribute nearly 14% of profits. As a global hub for innovation and advanced manufacturing, Shanghai has delivered impressive results in this round of gradual cultivation. By the time the seventh batch of lists was announced in October 2025, the total number of “Little Giants” in Shanghai had surpassed 1,000 for the first time.

Companies like Nextech, Benyao Technology, Zhijing Technology, and Shuli Innovation exemplify the “youthful” and “frontier” characteristics of the seventh batch of “Little Giants.” They have successfully established closed loops from technological breakthroughs to commercial implementation in fields such as adaptive robotics, intelligent automation in life sciences, industrial internet in textiles, and medical device innovation. By focusing on specialized segments, they navigate through cyclical fluctuations and drive the evolution of the industrial chain toward greater certainty.

Nextech: Redefining the “Technical Boundaries” of Flexible Manufacturing with General Intelligence

Nextech has carved a unique path distinct from traditional industrial automation by pioneering a new category of “Adaptive Robots.” Currently, the global tech community is on the brink of an explosion of “embodied intelligence,” shifting its focus to solving the flexible challenges of the “last mile of automation.” This new category directly addresses the pain points of flexible manufacturing through a core emphasis on “general intelligence” and “human-like capabilities.” By deeply integrating industrial-grade force control, computer vision, and advanced AI, Nextech equips robots with near-human perception and brain-like decision-making abilities, creating a foundation for general intelligent robots. This approach not only tackles uncertainties arising from variations in workpiece tolerances and positions but also lays the groundwork for further development of embodied intelligence in complex scenarios that heavily rely on “tactile feedback,” such as polishing and precision assembly.

The technical universality of Nextech serves as the underlying logic for its leap forward. Based on a “high-precision force control + cross-scenario AI decision-making” framework, Nextech has built a “one core, multiple uses” technology reuse system. The precise force control and intelligent algorithms developed for industrial applications have been adapted to non-industrial settings, evolving into advanced technicians capable of handling food materials or simulating massage techniques, thereby extending industrial-grade reliability and precision to broader applications. The explosive growth of Nextech is attributed to the robust industrial ecosystem and targeted policy support in Shanghai’s “Double High Grounds.” With a significant presence in high-end manufacturing and AI innovation, Shanghai’s vast automotive, aerospace, and integrated circuit industries provide rigorous technical validation environments for Nextech. The systematic allocation of resources within the “specialized, refined, unique, and new” cultivation system accelerates the transition from technological prototypes to commercial realization.

Benyao Technology: AI and Science Empowering Each Other to Build a Comprehensive Self-Developed Base

As the wave of “AI+” deeply penetrates core research scenarios, Benyao Technology has centered its core offering around laboratory-specific robots, profoundly practicing the mutual empowerment of AI and science. By integrating algorithms with intelligent scheduling, the company accelerates discovery through AI while using scientific theory to inform decision-making. This collaboration is reshaping research processes in life sciences and new materials, significantly shortening the previously lengthy screening cycles from over a decade to a more efficient exploration model in high-dimensional search spaces with millions of formula compositions.

Founded in March 2021, Benyao Technology has rapidly emerged as a significant driver of the “intelligence-intensive” research revolution within just five years. The company is continuously transforming laboratories from reliance on “golden hands” to a scalable innovation model centered on systematic intelligence. As small nucleic acid drugs transition from “trendy” to “certain,” Benyao Technology’s systemic capabilities consistently deliver value in the implementation of cutting-edge technologies. Addressing the challenges faced by a leading domestic pharmaceutical company regarding lengthy manual experimental processes, low efficiency, and poor data consistency, Benyao Technology’s intelligent automation platform seamlessly connects the entire workflow from cell processing to nucleic acid extraction and PCR construction. This has enhanced daily sample processing capacity by four times, reduced labor costs by over 70%, and, through domestic supply chain support, decreased key material costs by approximately 50%. The laboratory database integrates with AI analysis software, marking not only a leap in efficiency but also a qualitative transformation in the certainty and exploratory nature of the research process.

The foundation of this transformation lies in Benyao Technology’s solid product capabilities, built upon a combination of “high-performance hardware + cutting-edge AI algorithms.” The company has integrated robotics, vision, and AI technologies to create intelligent systems capable of supporting complex experimental workflows, achieving experimental capabilities beyond traditional human reach. Its self-developed embodied intelligent laboratory robots are exploring the realization of full-link intelligence from experimental design to result optimization. Through seamless collaboration between “robot agents (precise hand-eye coordination)” and “experimental agents (decision-making brains),” the robots simulate the cognitive loops of seasoned scientists, autonomously completing the processes of “recognition – analysis – optimization – execution,” embedding intelligence throughout the experimental journey.

Targeting overseas markets, Benyao Technology leverages a dual-driven approach of “standardized product platforms + agile customization capabilities” to navigate the complex and stringent technical and compliance environments of European and American markets. With a differentiated product positioning and advantages, the company successfully fills market gaps in mature overseas markets by offering standardized solutions for scalability while providing intelligent services covering the entire lifecycle for high-end clients. Thanks to the R&D and cost advantages afforded by China’s intelligent manufacturing industry chain, Benyao Technology has maintained a high contribution rate in its main business revenue for three consecutive years, transforming local supply chain efficiencies into sustainable global competitiveness. Looking toward the long-term trends of global scientific research and industrial upgrades, Benyao Technology aims to leverage the blue ocean of market opportunities to continuously deliver replicable and evolvable laboratory automation “Chinese solutions,” facilitating the research system’s transition toward a more efficient and certain intelligent future.

Shuli Innovation: Bridging the Application Gap of Brain-Machine Interfaces through Medical Engineering Verification

If laboratory automation emphasizes “process autonomy,” then in healthcare scenarios, hard technology must undergo repeated validation in “real wards, real patients, and real treatment courses” to transform technical advantages into replicable delivery capabilities. For Shuli Innovation, being recognized as a “Little Giant” means not only receiving policy support but also gaining authoritative credibility in the hospital and market sectors. Only when technology is tested repeatedly in real clinical settings can a company’s core competitiveness evolve from “parameter advantages” to “replicable clinical delivery capabilities.” According to reports, a patient at Wuhan Union Hospital’s medical-engineering integration innovation center, who suffered a stroke in 2022 and had poor recovery, underwent treatment with Shuli Innovation’s brain-machine interface product for three weeks in 2025, resulting in a remarkable recovery from a state of inability to extend curled fingers to being able to grasp a water bottle and accurately take medication. This efficacy validates the potential of non-invasive brain-machine interface technology in reshaping neural pathways and signifies that domestic brain-machine interface technology has progressed beyond mere signal collection, now possessing the capability to address clinical challenges such as central nervous system damage and consciousness disorders.

As a “new face” within the China Pavilion at the eighth China International Import Expo, Shuli Innovation’s breakthrough lies in establishing a development path characterized by “independent innovation, clinical verification, and scenario closure.” Unlike the early industry’s single-point breakthroughs, Shuli Innovation has achieved qualitative changes across brain signal sensing, chips, decoding algorithms, and multimodal integration, successfully transforming cutting-edge technologies into standardized, serious medical products and completing its transition from a startup to a national-level “Little Giant.” This methodology of “clinical traction, engineering closure” resonates strongly with Shanghai’s future industrial cultivation logic. The “Shanghai Brain-Machine Interface Future Industry Cultivation Action Plan” clearly defines a pathway centered on medical-grade scenarios for implementation. Benefiting from Shanghai’s rich interdisciplinary research environment, which boasts top-notch brain science resources and mature instrumentation engineering capabilities, Shuli Innovation is accelerating the resolution of technological and application barriers through policy guidance and deep collaboration with top-tier hospitals, positioning itself as a leader in the industry.

Zhijing Technology: Reconstructing the Entire Digital Intelligence Chain to Break the “Involution Dilemma” of Traditional Industries

Translating from industrial and research to clinical validation represents a “closed-loop implementation.” When this closed loop enters traditional industries, the question of whether digital intelligence can transform uncertainty into calculable certainty becomes crucial to transcending cycles. In the “International Textile Capital” of Shaoxing Keqiao, Zhijing Technology’s Feisuo Smart Weaving System is driving an industrial renewal and upgrade. Addressing the pain points of traditional factories that rely on manual statistics and prone to errors, Zhijing Technology has upgraded digitization from “a table” to “a comprehensive industry foundation system,” promoting digital transformation in factories and enhancing overall production and operational efficiency. Currently, the system has connected over 700,000 weaving machines, allowing real-time visualization of orders, machine status, and production capacity, thereby improving supply chain collaboration through intelligent matching of capacity and demand.

Deeper transformations are occurring on the production side: in the Sichuan Zhijing Textile Intelligent Manufacturing Park, the introduction of “Smart Patrol Weaving Inspection Robots” and an AI model for detecting fabric flaws has raised the defect identification rate to over 90%. “This means a medium-sized factory can leverage high quality and low operational costs brought by intelligent solutions to carve out a path of ‘technical density’ against ‘scale density,'” said Zhijing Technology’s Vice President Guan Ruifeng. As a “Little Giant” enterprise rooted in Shanghai that integrates AI centers with industry interconnectivity headquarters, Zhijing Technology fully capitalizes on Shanghai’s global perspective and talent density spillover effects. Shanghai, as a hub connecting the Yangtze River Delta manufacturing base with global trade windows, provides a springboard for enterprises to tackle basic algorithm challenges and achieve global commercialization, continuously delivering integrated software and hardware solutions and propelling China’s textile and apparel industry from a “world factory” to a “global digital engine.”

Conclusion

As technology evolves, the challenge lies in deeply integrating technological innovation with industrial innovation. The four “new” Little Giants—Nextech, Benyao Technology, Shuli Innovation, and Zhijing Technology—provide a unified answer at various stages of the industrial chain: exchanging “real capabilities” for “real implementation” and acting as “connectors” for key application scenarios, facilitating seamless integration between innovation chains and industrial chains. This collective emergence is a natural result of Shanghai’s systematic industrial ecosystem cultivation. Shanghai has established a gradient growth pathway for science and technology and innovative small and medium enterprises: on the technology side, guiding companies to leverage high-level institutions to undertake national projects and tackle critical areas; on the financial side, utilizing the “specialized, refined, unique, and new” board and targeted funding support for R&D expansion, thereby creating a closed-loop for full-factor empowerment.

Looking to the future, Shanghai is promoting iterative upgrades of policy tools: relying on “enterprise data foundations” to accurately identify potential “seeds,” while incorporating AI and future industries to expand pathways; deepening “service packages” and financing support to construct a comprehensive safeguard chain throughout the “growth—review—leap” cycle. With the dual support of policies and finance, these “Little Giants” will become key leverage points for strengthening and complementing chains, facilitating China’s manufacturing sector’s ascent to the high end of the global value chain.