«China 2025» strategy re-examined

Where does China stand in strategic technologies?
“China 2025” strategy
In 2015 China launched an ambitious plan to become a technology superpower by 2049. The “China 2025” strategy defines core industries, such as robotics, pharma, electric vehicles, aerospace, and advanced digitisation, in which China wants to become globally competitive and largely independent of foreign technology.
By 2025 the strategic goal was to significantly increase innovation capacity. At the World Economic Forum 2025 we presented our new analysis on where China currently stands in these strategic technologies from a high-quality patent perspective.
China’s technological milestones surpassed
It is clear that China’s goal to “significantly increase its innovation capacity” is a massive understatement. China is already the world leader in five of these technologies (railways, advanced digitalisation, ships, robotics, green energy) and second in four others (new materials, power equipment, aerospace, electric vehicles). They lag behind in agriculture and pharmaceuticals. In artificial intelligence, arguably the most important digital technology, China has a world share of 47%.
Chinese world share in high-quality patents (world-class patents) in selected technologies, 2010-2025