With more than 40 years of experience in industrial design practice, Tong has long been committed to research on brand design strategy and management, regional design trends and product design.

A graduate from the Department of Ceramic Art Design of the Central Academy of Arts and Crafts (now the Academy of Fine Arts, Tsinghua University), he obtained his master’s degree at the Department of Arts and Crafts of Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts in 1986. After graduation, he has stayed in the school to teach until now.

He has served as the director of the Department of Design Art of Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts, the vice president and dean of the School of Design, and the dean of the School of Industrial Design. He is a member of the Design Teaching Steering Committee of the Ministry of Education, the deputy director of the Industrial Design Teaching Guidance Sub-Committee, the vice chairman of the Guangdong Industrial Design Association, and the chairman of the Interaction Design Professional Committee.

In 2017, he proposed the theoretical concept of Brand Driven by Design (BDD). In early 2018, the BDDWATCH research platform was launched to fully promote the development of BDD theory and startups in China.