Rudong county, located in Nantong city in East China's Jiangsu province, is anticipating a major boost to its economy moving forwards after representatives of 30 projects mandated agreements involving a combined investment of 47.56 billion yuan ($7.27 billion) at a signing ceremony on March 31.

Out of the total, 11 were valued at more than 1 billion yuan each, including a 20-billion-yuan project developing carbon fiber composite materials, a 6-billion-yuan new materials project and a 5-billion-yuan project focusing on high-efficiency heterojunction battery production plant. Heterojunction batteries utilize a brand new photovoltaic – or solar power – cell production technology.

There was another signing ceremony held the day before, involving a "5G + industrial internet" industrial project that involves the largest single investment of its kind in Rudong's history. The partnership is between Asia Pulp & Paper (APP) Sinar Mas Group and China Telecom. Another project plans to build an industrial internet digital transformation service platform and is being led by Shenzhen Honeycomb Technologies.

Investors at the signing ceremony praised Rudong's robust port industry and other developments, its favorable geographical location as well as its business environment.

Shen Junfeng, Party chief of Rudong, said each project would be assigned a designated liaison leader and service team to assist in the project process in areas relating to its scope, schedule and document approvals, among other things.