Liyang溧阳

Liyang has been a city since the Qin Dynasty — more than 2,000 years ago, from the era of the Terracotta Warriors. Song of a Wanderer (游子吟), one of the most memorized poems in the Chinese literary canon, was written here; Li Bai, China's most celebrated classical poet, also passed through and left verses. The land is 30% mountains, 10% water, and 60% farmland. Three scenic areas, including Tianmu Lake, hold China's 5A designation — the highest in the national tourism system, awarded to fewer than 350 sites nationwide. The Liyang No.1 Highway was named one of China's ten most scenic rural roads, and the city holds the rare World Longevity Hometown designation recognizing exceptional life expectancy.

Liyang's industrial story begins with traditional power equipment manufacturing — cables, transformers, and switchgear that made it a national hub for the electricity supply chain, with smart grid output now exceeding ¥50B. The pivotal moment came in the mid-2010s when CATL, the world's largest battery manufacturer, chose Liyang as a major production base. Over 100 supply-chain companies followed. The battery cluster now accounts for over 11% of China's total output — from a city of 800,000 people. With 97% supply chain completeness, a new entrant can source almost every component locally. CATL Phase IV went from contract to first product in 363 days. Looking forward, Liyang is positioning in three emerging areas: new energy storage (extending the battery cluster to grid-scale applications), low-altitude economy (leveraging Changdang Lake Airport, a dedicated UAV township at Biqiao, and the Nanjing Aeronautics University campus), and biomanufacturing (built around the Tianmuhu Health Research Institute and Jiangnan University's synthetic biology center).