On July 30, the second “Wisdom Converges in Xiaoxiang, Talent Flocks to Star City” 2025 World-Class PhD Matchmaking Fair—co-hosted by the Hunan Provincial Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese and the Changsha Municipal Government—opened in Changsha.
Hunan Provincial Party Committee Standing Committee member and head of the United Front Work Department, Sui Zhongcheng, delivered the opening address. Changsha Municipal Party Committee Standing Committee member, head of the Organization Department, and director of the Municipal Talent Office, Li Tiehua, also attended.
ZH Energy, a leading Changsha-based new-energy technology company, was invited as an outstanding local startup. Co-founder Dr. Xie Wei took the stage as the entrepreneurial speaker, sharing with top PhD talent from around the world his heartfelt story of a “mutual journey” with Changsha and issuing a warm invitation to global elites: “Choose Changsha, win the future together!”
A native of China, Dr. Xie earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in materials science from Tsinghua University and his PhD from the University of Texas at Austin. He once led the civilian conversion of cutting-edge flow-battery technology at U.S. defense giant Raytheon Technologies, a project that later received the prestigious R&D 100 Award. Yet the road to industrialization abroad was strewn with obstacles—fragmented supply chains, exorbitant manufacturing costs, and low R&D and production efficiency. Driven by a dream to let technology truly benefit society, he decided to return to China.
Explaining why he planted roots in “Star City,” Dr. Xie drew on personal experience to highlight Changsha’s “hard-core advantages” for attracting top global talent:
• Changsha is fertile ground for frontier technologies to bloom. The city has made new energy and new materials core industries and is striving to become a “Global R&D Center City,” perfectly aligned with ZH Energy’s mission to break the foreign monopoly on ion-exchange membranes—the “choke-point” material in flow batteries.
• Close collaboration with top teams at Central South University has accelerated the leap from laboratory to market.
• The city provides rock-solid “shop-assistant” support along the entrepreneurial journey—from the Xiangjiang New Area “Thousands of PhDs & Myriads of Masters” talent program and generous subsidies to rent waivers and R&D funding, policies arrive like “timely rain,” dissolving early-stage pressures.
• Changsha possesses a powerful talent magnet. As the “World Capital of Construction Machinery,” it is home to giants like Sany and Zoomlion whose deep manufacturing heritage and vast pool of engineers form an invaluable reservoir for the new-energy sector.
• It is a vibrant startup hub. Whether in government-organized matchmaking events or open peer exchanges, a spirit of pragmatism and mutual help prevails, making Changsha one of the nation’s top cities for net population inflow and the destination of choice for young talent.
Thanks to this unparalleled ecosystem, ZH Energy—an epitome of Changsha’s startup success—has achieved remarkable growth: in just three years it went from zero to a 100 MW/year flow-battery stack production line; partnered with State Grid to build the world’s first sulfur-iron flow-battery demonstration project; exported its storage products to high-end markets in Europe, the United States, and Japan; earned a spot among the “Top 50” of the China Innovation & Entrepreneurship Competition; and secured equity investment from Sequoia China, Hidden Hill Capital, and CMB International.
Wisdom converges in Xiaoxiang, talent flocks to Star City! ZH Energy looks forward to standing shoulder-to-shoulder with more like-minded top-tier talents on this land of opportunity and vitality, striving together to create brilliance!
Product Series：
Flow Battery Test Platform
