China will build its largest manufacturing base for numerical control machine tools in Beijing with the combined efforts of the Beijing No.1 Machine Tool Plant and Japan's Okuma Corporation, according to a contract signed in Beijing on Saturday.
Jia Qinglin, a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and secretary of the Beijing Municipal Committee of the CPC, voiced hopes for good results from this cooperative venture while meeting Masahiro Kitajima, vice-president of Okuma, before the contract signing ceremony.
Jia said that the municipal government considered it vital to upgrade the old traditional industries with high-technologies.
Kitajima said they would spare no efforts to speed up construction of the new plant -- the BYJC-Okuma (Beijing) Machine Tool Ltd.- via close cooperation with the Chinese manufacturer.
BYJC-Okuma would become one of the world's top machine tool producers and the largest in China, said Kitajima.
Wang Jisheng, board chairman of Beijing No.1 Machine Tool Plant, revealed that work on the joint venture will begin in June this year. It is expected to start operating in October, 2003.
With an initial annual output of 200 machine tools, the new enterprise aim to produce 1,000 tools annually, said Wang.
BYJC-Okuma has a total registered capital of over one hundred million yuan (US$12 million).
(People's Daily May 28, 2002)
