Nan ZHAO studied sociology, philosophy, international relations and economics at Essex University in the U.K.

After returning from abroad, ZHAO set up a metal-based ceramic composite industrialization project team in 2013, with professional R&D personnel, including professors, associate professors and doctors, postgraduate students and overseas students and his team has been dedicated to professional R&D, production and sales of parts and components of metal-based ceramic composite materials.

In 2015, ZHAO and his partners established Zhuhai Kilter New Materials Co., Ltd (hereinafter referred as "Kilter") in Zhuhai Aviation Industrial Park, which was officially put into operation in 2016. Facing opportunities brought by military-civilian integration, Kilter hopes to provide solutions to transform and upgrade China's military equipment into the one with miniaturization and light weight, to support China's manufacturing to make a historical leap from large-scale development to a strong one, and to forge a "strategic backbone" for the country. Therefore, since its official operation, Kilter has taken national defense applications as its starting point to the market and focuses on the industrialization of metal-based ceramic composite materials. In key parts and components of aerospace engines, metal-based ceramic composite materials can be used as substitutes for aluminum alloy, titanium alloy and beryllium materials, with outstanding wear resistance, damping and thermal conductivity. With the mission of serving China's modernization, it focuses on scientific and technological innovation of new materials and has achieved significant research results in this area.