Opening the "Zhihang Tongtu" inland waterway intelligent agent, the screen clearly displays obstacle targets within a specific inland waterway. "The intelligent agent can automatically arrange surveying tasks, compute sonar data, and identify underwater feature targets. Survey results can be analyzed and mapped within 20 minutes, making channel changes and obstacle targets clearly visible," explained Chen Cheng, director of the Digital Center at Yangtze River Delta (Jiaxing) Urban-Rural Construction Design Group Co., Ltd. (referred to as the Design Group), a direct subsidiary of Jiaxing State-Owned Investment. In the field of urban planning and design, manual measurement and visual inspection have become a thing of the past. New technologies such as artificial intelligence and big data are now providing wings for the industry's rapid ascent. In recent years, the Design Group has systematically deployed AI technologies, continuously advancing the implementation of "AI+" scenarios. In this year's "Data Elements x" competition Zhejiang division Jiaxing station finals, the Design Group secured one first prize and two third prizes. AI is transforming from a technical concept into perceivable and measurable application scenarios.

AI empowerment is bridging the gap from paper blueprints to tangible on-ground results. Inland waterway maintenance has long faced challenges including equipment bottlenecks, heavy reliance on foreign software and hardware, low automation levels, and data black boxes. "Traditional underwater surveying typically employs single-beam sonar equipment, requiring extensive manual processing after measurement, which is both time-consuming and imprecise," Chen Cheng noted. Today, the Design Group has developed the "Zhihang Tongtu" inland waterway intelligent agent for underwater maintenance, built on domestically produced equipment. The project revolves around three core areas: "fully domestic equipment manufacturing, multimodal knowledge base construction, and large model intelligent agent development," driving the transformation of waterway maintenance from "manual inspection plus experiential upkeep" to "AI automated inspection plus preventive maintenance." This directly serves Jiaxing's waterway transportation digital transformation and the surveying of 4,000 kilometers of backbone waterways in northern Zhejiang, enabling underwater monitoring to be "captured and utilized on demand." The project has established a complete domestic information innovation equipment system and the first multimodal knowledge base for waterway maintenance in China, providing comprehensive support for dredging, navigation assurance, and maintenance decision-making. Through this project, Jiaxing's backbone waterway maintenance has achieved automatic disease detection and automated work order dispatch, improving the efficiency of navigation assurance thematic map generation by approximately 60%, effectively ensuring management-side "data clarity" and enterprise-side "cost reduction and efficiency enhancement."

Driving water transport digitalization, supporting state-owned asset management, enabling comprehensive urban governance, and empowering urban-rural planning and design—the Design Group is dedicated to creating AI technology innovation applications that foster high-quality economic and social development and enterprise digital transformation, building a series of "AI+" state-owned enterprise transformation scenarios. Based on the disaster prevention realities of the Hangjiahu Plain, characterized by dense river networks, contiguous polder areas, and recurrent hydrological conditions, the Design Group has also developed a multi-source data-driven intelligent platform for plain water network "four pre" (forecast, early warning, rehearsal, and response) capabilities. This platform breaks down traditional water conservancy data silos, aggregating 52 items of multi-source water conservancy data across five major categories, including meteorological forecasts, hydrological monitoring, engineering scheduling, and geospatial information. During the defense against Typhoon "Bavi" this year—the ninth typhoon of the season—the platform conducted 11 rolling forecasts, dynamically updated water level trends at nine representative stations across the city, achieved intelligent judgment and rolling warnings for typhoon defense situations, and digitally empowered scientific scheduling and flood control decision-making.

Consolidating the foundation, the collaborative efforts of platforms, data, and ecosystems are driving application scenarios. These projects did not emerge from thin air; they are rooted in the AI technology foundation the Design Group has continuously strengthened over many years. In 2025, the Design Group's Digital Center is advancing platform construction around core components including enterprise large model knowledge base management systems, multi-user intelligent workbenches, multi-model integration engines, large model toolboxes, and large model application hubs, developing the "Sheji Zhujia" large model application assistant platform. On this platform, more than ten AI specialized tools—covering institutional retrieval, business data queries, design scheme review, contract review, and knowledge base management—are clearly displayed. "While developing the foundational platform, we are simultaneously researching large model all-in-one machine products, aimed at providing integrated software-hardware, information innovation compliant, one-stop large model application products for small-scale scenarios," said Ling Li, senior engineer at the Design Group's Digital Center. Hosting the "Shuchuang Weilai" AI Innovation Application Competition provides a powerful impetus for the enterprise to implement its three major initiatives—"service quality improvement, business innovation breakthroughs, and management efficiency upgrades"—and its "going global" strategy. Through co-establishing the AI Innovation Application Joint Laboratory with Zhejiang University of Technology, unveiling the "Design Consulting Intelligent Agent Innovation Platform" with Nanhu Laboratory, and building high-level industry-academia-research platforms, more replicable and promotable application outcomes are rapidly taking shape. The Design Group's affiliated Jiaxing Surveying and Mapping Company, leveraging its professional strengths in surveying and mapping geographic information and focusing on the "spatiotemporal intelligence" direction, is building high-quality datasets for AI on one hand while promoting AI's integration into map applications, business systems, and research projects on the other, gradually forming a business layout of "data foundation plus AI empowerment." From sustained deep cultivation of application scenarios to systematic construction of capability foundations and open collaborative innovation ecosystems, the Design Group is steadily transforming AI's "possibilities" into tangible "productivity."