An artist's rendition of the Nanda Smart City in suburban Baoshan District.

Shanghai's former chemical industry base in the northern outskirts is set to become an innovation hub, accommodating a host of high-tech and intelligent projects.

With a total investment of 12 billion yuan (US$1.7 billion), 22 projects of strategic emerging industries signed agreements on Thursday to develop in Nanda area of Baoshan District.

The new projects mainly cover biomedicine, new materials, robot and intelligent equipment to help transform the former polluted industrial park into a futuristic smart city.

"The erstwhile iron-steel industry base in Baoshan is being transformed into the main front of the city's global scientific innovation center and a demonstration of low-carbon development," said Chen Jie, Party secretary of Baoshan.

The south-north transformation of the former iron-steel industries in northern Baoshan District and the chemical industries in southern Jinshan District has been listed as Shanghai's key development blueprint in the 2035 master plan, along with the five "new cities" in the suburbs.

As a key part of the "north transformation," Nanda, covering 6.3 square kilometers, is rising from the former Nanda Industrial Site, notorious for soil and air pollution. The area connects two ancient towns of the city – Nanxiang in Jiading District and Dachang in Baoshan.

According to the blueprint, the future digital city will feature parks, waterways and transit-oriented development projects, along with sprawling underground space for Metro stations and commercial facilities.

An artist's rendition of the Nanda Smart City

Among the new projects, Cheerland Biomed, a Shenzhen-based biomedicine startup, plans to build one of the world's biggest CDMO (contract development manufacture organization) research and development centers.

Baozheng Pharm will develop a production base with an annual capacity of about 50 million tablets of medicines and 20 million pieces of apparatuses, focusing on women's health.

A steel mould R&D platform of Shanghai University is expected to break the monopoly of foreign manufacturers.

Meanwhile, construction started on Thursday on a talent rental apartment project in Nanda to mainly accommodate professionals from both home and abroad to work for these high-tech projects.

Nanda was once the city's leather production and chemical engineering center with more than 200 companies and factories, but pollution and safety concerns meant the site was known as one of the city's most polluted areas.

Action against the problems began in 2009 and more than 50 companies were shut down. Most of the land has since been remediated.

The region has finished its comprehensive pollution treatment campaign, including land remediation.