New quality productive forces reshape China's new growth momentum

Editor's note: Liu Chunsheng, a special commentator on current affairs for CGTN, is an associate professor at the Beijing-based Central University of Finance and Economics.

The "new momentum" signal in Q3 data

According to data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), China's economy grew 4.6% year-on-year in the first three quarters of 2026, putting the full-year growth target of 4.5%–5% within reach. But what truly deserves attention is not the stabilization of the aggregate, but the surging force within the structure.

In Q3, the value of project contracts related to new infrastructure such as computing power, data, and networks rose 34.2% year-on-year and hit 50.4% in September alone. Capital investment in frontier fields such as AI and humanoid robots grew 184.1% year-on-year, with September growth reaching 198.7%. Meanwhile, the NBS reported that the manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) for September returned to 50.1%, back above the 50-point boom-bust line.

Behind this investment boom lies the explosive growth of computing power capacity. As of the end of June this year, China had 15.56 million standard racks in use, and its intelligent computing power capacity reached 2,185 EFLOPS, up 177% year-on-year. By the end of Q3, it had surged to 2,592 EFLOPS, up 146% year-on-year. The figure exceeds the 2,576.5 figure projected by the end of 2026 in a joint report by the International Data Corporation (IDC) and Inspur Information. The core AI industry has surpassed 1.2 trillion yuan in scale, with more than 6,200 related enterprises.

The investment surge is not an isolated phenomenon. It is the result of the "East Data, West Computing" project and the national integrated computing power network policy taking effect. New infrastructure for computing power, data, and networks is becoming the underlying foundation of the new round of growth, much as railways and power grids were in their day. As aggregate growth and momentum transformation move in tandem, China's economy is delivering on its commitment to "foster new drivers of growth through scientific and technological innovation."

AI: From "a single technology" to "deep industrial transformation"

In the past, talk of artificial intelligence centered on a model or a product. Today, AI's coordinates are shifting from the technology side to the industry side.

The numbers tell the story best. To date, the adoption rate of AI technology among manufacturing enterprises above designated size has surpassed 30%, and overall penetration in key industries exceeds 80%. In intelligent manufacturing, China has cumulatively built 35,000 basic-level smart factories and more than 8,200 advanced-level ones. AI is no longer a lab demonstration; it has become a factor of production embedded in specific links such as product R&D, quality inspection, and customer service. In the first half of this year, China shipped more than 40,000 humanoid robots, lifting its global share to 97%; industrial robot output grew 28.5% year-on-year. The country's first fully domestically built 100,000-card AI supercluster was officially put into operation, with core software and hardware entirely self-developed and controllable.

Emerging industries redraw China's regional economic map

The significance of new quality productive forces goes beyond serving as a growth engine that enlarges the aggregate. It is quietly redrawing China's regional economic map. Unlike ports and mineral resources, new factors of production such as computing power and data are not constrained by geographic location, nor do they depend on existing industrial clusters the way traditional manufacturing does. This gives underdeveloped regions which were left behind in the industrial era great chances to compete on equal footing with the eastern regions, or even to overtake them by changing lanes. The "East Data, West Computing" project is precisely the policy vehicle for this logic: channeling the East's strong demand for computing power into the vast hinterland of the West, which is rich in energy and cool in climate. Ulanqab, in central Inner Mongolia, is the most vivid example of this possibility turning into reality.

Located 240 kilometers from Beijing, Ulanqab is one of the eight national computing hub nodes. Its computing capacity in operation has reached 190,000 P, with intelligent computing accounting for over 95%. It has signed a cumulative total of 109 computing center projects, and leading companies including Huawei, Alibaba, ByteDance, and Apple have successively established operations there.

Ulanqab's opportunity lies in converting comparative advantages into industrial advantages. This small city is attempting to upgrade from selling server racks to selling tokens and services, enabling large model capabilities to be converted into industry locally.

From the investment signals in Q3 data, to the industrial transformation of computing power integrating into the value chain, to regional exemplars like Ulanqab, a transition is coming into focus: China's new growth momentum is shifting from "single point breakthroughs in new technologies" to "the systematic reshaping of traditional industries and the regional map by new technologies." When scientific and technological innovation truly enters the industrial chain, the imagination of growth has only just begun.