Representatives of China Construction Bank, Shenyang Machine Tool Group and Yingkou Port Group sign a cooperation agreement on May 2. [Photo/Xinhua]

China Construction Bank (CCB) will provide 30 billion yuan ($4.35 billion) to support State-owned enterprises in Northeast China to conduct technical reforms and product development, as a step to rejuvenate the economy in the old industrial base.

As a once thriving industrial base, Northeast China, which covers Liaoning, Jilin and Heilongjiang is bearing the brunt of a more acute slowdown than the rest of the country, trailing well behind in terms of GDP growth. The region’s economy relies largely on heavy industry, energy resources, raw materials and a large proportion of State-owned enterprises.

Yingkou Port Group and Shenyang Machine Tool Group, as regional representative State-owned enterprises, signed a strategic cooperation agreement with China Construction Bank on May 2. China Construction Bank will respectively inject 20 billion yuan and 10 billion yuan for Yingkou Port Group and Shenyang Machine Tool Group to help them to conduct industrial transform and develop new technologies.

China’s machine tool manufacturing giant, Shenyang Machine Tool Group, which used to suffer difficulties with financing and from its assets structure, will take advantage of the 10-billion yuan loan to prioritize technical research and development of i5 (industrialization, informatization, internet, intelligentialize and integration) intelligent technology application, providing an integrated solution for the consumer electronics field, and the establishment of intelligent workshops connected to the internet. Shenyang Machine Tool Group will also carry out a strategy to transform its business model and internal assets by using loans.