On October 28, 2019, China Marine Equipment Inspection and Testing Alliance was launched in Qingdao. This alliance integrates and shares the advantageous resources from "industries, universities, research institutes, inspection and testing sector, market and capital community" in China's marine equipment industry chain to promote independent innovation and technological breakthroughs, testing technology upgrades, and standard system improvement. The alliance aims to promote joint research for building a quality-assurance technology system and an integrated one-stop service and innovation platform to support domestic marine equipment industry and carry out international mutual recognition to provide technical support for China's marine equipment enterprises going global. 

Zou Chuanning, deputy director-general of the Standing Committee of Qingdao Municipal People's Congress, Mo Jianhui, president of China Classification Society, Liu Qiang, vice president of National Institute of Metrology, Li Aixian, vice president of China National Institute of Standardization, Guo Mingke, director-general of North Sea Bureau of Ministry of Natural Resources, Li Fengli, general manager of Shandong Port Group and chairman of Qingdao Port Group, Chen Yue, division chief from the Accreditation and Inspection Supervision  Department of State Administration for Market Regulation, Guo Dalei, deputy director of Shandong Administration for Market Regulation, Gou Tuan Nian, director of Qingdao Municipal Marine Development Bureau, Wang Liyu, party secretary and chairman of Qingdao NMEI Group jointly pressed the button to launch the alliance. Also present at the launch ceremony were officials and guests from SASAC of Qingdao Municipal Government, Qingdao Administration for Market Regulation, Qingdao Development and Reform Commission, Qingdao Science and Technology Bureau, Qingdao Oceanic Valley Administration, Qingdao National Laboratory for Marine Science and Technology, Qingdao Branch of Agricultural Bank of China, Qingdao Branch of China Construction Bank, Qingdao Branch of Bank of Communications, Qingdao Rural Commercial Bank, Bank of Qingdao and Qingdao Branch of Shanghai Pudong Development Bank.

Mo Jianhui, president of China Classification Society, said in his speech that the goal of the alliance is to build a platform of four functions. This platform to be built will be a mult-center one, pooling the resources and capabilities across the whole inspection and testing equipment industry by means of blockchain technology. Its four functions are service, R&D, sharing and cooperation. First, in terms of service, it will serve the government by providing services and support for the government's policy making, serve the industry by publishing industry development reports and providing support and assistance to alliance members, and serve the enterprise by matching supply  with demand in inspection and testing service. Second, in terms of R&D, it will establish a national expert think-tank to conduct research, collect research needs from the members, assign the right experts to undertake the research tasks and provide the members with timely sci-tech programs. Third, in terms of sharing, it will enable technology sharing through pooling the advantages of alliance members so as to enhance the technical capacity and level of the entire industry. Fourth, in terms of cooperation, it will promote cooperation among members in technology, business and projects to produce a strong synergy and serve the national strategy of marine power building. Meanwhile, it will also promote international cooperation by putting China in contact with the world to exchange views on problem-solving.

Zou Chuanning, deputy director-general of the Standing Committee of Qingdao Municipal People's Congress, said in his speech that the establishment of the China Marine Equipment Inspection and Testing Alliance is a key item on Qingdao’s 2019 agenda and the target task of the year for Qingdao's "Marine Campaign ". This alliance is designed to integrate the top domestic innovation resources in the field of marine equipment testing and certification, jointly carry out technical R&D to tackle bottlenecks in this sector and engage in standards R&D to improve the quality-assurance technology system of marine equipment. This is highly consistent with the current development needs of Qingdao's marine industry and will definitely play an important role in promoting the high-quality development of Qingdao's marine economy. Today's Qingdao is in a new historical position and stands at the forefront of a new round of China’s high-level development and opening-up. This Alliance will promote the "going global" of China's marine equipment industry by carrying out research on the connectivity of national quality systems among the “Belt &Road” countries and promoting trade facilitation, and also will certainly usher Qingdao into a new round of opening-up and development. The Qingdao municipality will go all out to support the alliance with various services and guarantees.

In his speech, Chen Yue, division chief from the Accreditation and Inspection Supervision Department of the State Administration for Market Regulation, called on all member units of the Alliance to take active part in the formulation and revision of the industry standards and play their due role in improving the quality-assurance technology system for marine equipment industry.

In his welcome speech, Wang liyu, party secretary and chairman of Qingdao NMEI Group, said that the establishment of the alliance enjoys strong support from the State Administration for Market Regulation, China Classification Society, the party committees and governments of Shandong Province and Qingdao Municipality as well as other relevant government departments, and receives active responses from more than 60 institutions, institutes and enterprises. We contribute wisdom and joint effort to the common goal of developing the marine industry and building China into a marine power. Qingdao NEMI Group will take good care of the daily routine at the Alliance and work together with all member units for a better future of the alliance.

In order to meet the market demand and contribute to the goal of building China into a marine power and manufacturing power, Qingdao NMEI Group, together with other leading institutions and enterprises in this industry such as China Classification Society, China National Institute of Standardization, National Institute of Metrology, Qingdao National Laboratory for Marine Science and Technology and Institute of Oceanology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, initiated the China Marine Equipment Inspection and Testing Alliance. The Alliance is expected to, through building a working mechanism, effectively pool and allocate innovative technology resources among members so as to jointly solve technical problems and promote quality control of the whole supply chain, industrial chain and product life cycle, covering R&D design, type test, production and manufacturing, use and maintenance, service extension and scrapping. The Alliance also aims to carry out effective cooperation in the four aspects of measurement, standard setting, inspection and testing and certification, formulating timely and widely applicable group or industry standards to meet the needs of the marine equipment industry and help with its transformation and upgrading. Under the guidance of relevant authorities, the alliance will provide all-round, multi-angle and multi-dimensional technical support for the upgrading of the national marine equipment industry and promote the high-quality development through quality innovation. Qingdao NMEI Group will make good use of the three national innovation platforms, namely, the National Marine Equipment Quality Inspection Center, National Engineering Laboratory for Subsea Equipment  Testing and Detection Technology and National Platform for Major Marine Equipment R&D, Inspection and Detection, taking good care of the daily running of the alliance.

Once established, the Alliance will, not only continue to implement relevant industrial policies and meet requirements from the authorities for the development of quality- assurance technology in China's marine equipment industry, but also engage in resource sharing, alliance standard setting, discussion of alliance certification, research on the connectivity of the “Belt &Road” countries’ national quality systems and trade facilitation. The alliance also plans to establish an accreditation system with China’s independent intellectual property rights for laboratory accreditation and newly-invented-product certification and a market competition mechanism in the field of marine equipment testing and certification that all domestic and foreign market players will abide by and equally participate in, thus enabling mutual recognition between the alliance and the major international testing and certification bodies to support China’s marine equipment industry "going global".