New forces to drive economic growth

China's sharpening focus on cultivating new quality productive forces and bolstering technological innovation will drive industrial upgrades and inject strong impetus into the country's economic growth, while offering immense business opportunities for investors both at home and abroad, said experts and company executives.

As the country is doubling down on its innovation-driven development strategy, they noted that strategic emerging industries and industries of the future are expected to usher in a broader space for development, while calling for efforts to boost innovation in cutting-edge and disruptive technologies, to foster new growth drivers and gain a competitive edge in an increasingly fierce international arena.

The country will establish a national venture capital guidance fund in the near future, with the goal of enhancing, strengthening and expanding innovative enterprises, said the National Development and Reform Commission during the just-concluded two sessions.

The initiative came as this year's Government Work Report stated that China will strive to develop new quality productive forces in light of local conditions and accelerate the development of a modernized industrial system.

"New quality productive forces serve as a new engine for promoting high-quality development and advancing Chinese modernization, as well as a fresh driving force bolstering world economic growth," said Huang Hanquan, head of the Chinese Academy of Macroeconomic Research.

The country should firmly seize significant opportunities arising from a new round of technological revolution and industrial transformation, especially the iteration of new technologies such as artificial intelligence, and apply the technological innovation achievements to industrial chains in a timely manner, Huang said.

He stressed the need to transform and upgrade traditional industries, while nurturing patient capital and devoting more resources to emerging industries and future-oriented industries, to build up the momentum of new growth drivers.

"It is of vital significance to develop new quality productive forces based on local conditions, avoid blind investments in some specific fields and make full use of cutting-edge digital technologies, such as 5G, AI and internet of things to bolster industrial upgrade," said Pan Helin, a member of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology's Expert Committee for Information and Communication Economy.

Pan called for accelerated efforts to step up research and development investments in core technologies of key fields such as basic materials and software, precision components, integrated circuits and high-end equipment, as well as strengthen enterprises' dominant position in bolstering technological innovation.

Data from the National Bureau of Statistics showed that China's R&D expenditure exceeded 3.6 trillion yuan ($497.2 billion) in 2024, up 8.3 percent year-on-year, ranking second in the world.

Li Dongsheng, founder and chairman of consumer electronics company TCL Technology Group, said: "Chinese enterprises should play a bigger role in boosting technological innovation."

Li underscored the importance of optimizing the financing environment for China's high-tech manufacturing sector and increasing support for leading high-tech manufacturing companies.

Denis Depoux, global managing director of market consultancy Roland Berger, said China is not only a manufacturing powerhouse, but also a global innovation engine driving trends in digitalization, sustainability and high-tech industries.

"In the past decade, we have seen Chinese leapfrogging globally in many industries. China has now made rapid progress in the development of AI technology, becoming one of the global leaders, and the pace will further accelerate. AI will unlock massive opportunities for our business," he said.

Cui Jingyi, vice-president and general manager of industrial software developer Aveva China, said, "New quality productive forces are key to promoting the upgrading of China's industry and high-quality development," while highlighting that China is becoming the market with the most extensive application of AI technologies globally, bringing new opportunities for many companies including Aveva.

Cui said the company will continue to increase investments in China, aiming to continuously introduce global innovations to strengthen cooperation with local enterprises, optimize local business development models and jointly develop products and services that meet the needs of the market.