The digital economy continues to empower and enhance China’s economic vitality
Our reporter, Li Xiaohong
In 2023, with the in-depth implementation of the strategy of Digital China and Network Power, our country’s digital economy will be fully developed and develop rapidly. The digital economy has become a stabilizer, accelerator and multiplier for China’s economic and social development, and the greatest certainty to deal with uncertainty.
Experts interviewed by China Economic Times reporters believe that in 2023, our country’s digital development will continue to maintain a strong momentum, digital technology innovation will change with each passing day, the breadth of digital and real integration will continue to expand, and the development of digital economy industrial clusters will accelerate.
The digital economy is gaining momentum
"In recent years, our country has attached great importance to the development of the digital economy, continuously promoted digital industrialization and industrial digitalization, and created a digital industrial cluster with international competitiveness," Ding Minglei, a researcher at the China Academy of Science and Technology Development Strategy, said in an interview with China Economic Times reporters.
The latest data has witnessed the rapid development of our country’s digital economy. According to data from the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, the scale of our country’s digital economy will reach 50.20 trillion yuan in 2022, an increase of 10.3% year-on-year. The proportion of digital economy in GDP is equivalent to the proportion of the secondary industry in the national economy, reaching 41.5%. It is expected that the scale of our country’s digital economy will reach 56.10 trillion yuan in 2023 and 70.80 trillion yuan in 2025. At the same time, the application of new technologies represented by digital technology will promote the transformation and upgrading of thousands of industries. The role of digital economy in amplifying, superimposing and multiplying our country’s economic development is prominent, injecting new momentum into the high-quality development of China’s economy. As of September 2023, there were more than 530,000 companies operating in digital technologies such as cloud computing, big data, and artificial intelligence.
Wang Lei, a researcher at the China Academy of Macroeconomics, told the China Economic Times reporter that in 2023, the development of our country’s digital economy will be full of bright spots. First, the new digital infrastructure will continue to be consolidated. 5G, gigabit fiber broadband, industrial Internet, artificial intelligence and other digital new infrastructure will be deployed to accelerate the deployment, and the world’s largest, technologically advanced and superior digital new infrastructure system will be basically built, and the overall capacity will be leapfrogged.
The second is the continuous strengthening of digital science and technology innovation capabilities. The innovation-driven development strategy has been deeply implemented, the main body of digital science and technology innovation has accelerated growth, the achievements of digital science and technology innovation have continued to emerge, the level of digital technology self-reliance and self-improvement has been improved, and the ranks of the world’s most innovative countries have been accelerated. Third, the strength of digital industry clusters has been steadily improved. The integration of digital technology and the real economy has continued to accelerate, key digital industries have continued to grow, the multiplier effect of digital technology empowering thousands of industries has continued to appear, the traction role of digital consumption has been continuously consolidated, and the comprehensive competitiveness of digital industry clusters in our country
Breakthrough development in artificial intelligence
"In 2023, with the support of massive data resources, advanced computing power infrastructure, rich application scenarios, and high R & D investment, our country’s new generation of artificial intelligence has achieved remarkable results in technological innovation, industrial ecology, and integrated applications, and has entered the first echelon in the world," Wang Lei said.
MIIT data shows that from January to October, artificial intelligence and other digital emerging industries are booming, the scale of artificial intelligence core industries has reached 500 billion yuan, and the number of enterprises has exceeded 4,300, which has injected new impetus into the construction of a more complete and competitive digital economy industry ecosystem in our country.
It is worth noting that in 2023, generative artificial intelligence represented by large models will achieve breakthrough development and become the new commanding heights of current technological and industrial competition in various countries.
It is understood that our country’s innovative achievements in intelligent chips, development frameworks, general models, etc., Huawei, Inspur Information, Sim Computing, Biren Technology, Moore Thread and other chip companies have launched chip acceleration cards for AI inference and training tasks in different scenarios, involving CPU, GPU, RISC-V and other different design architectures; MindSpore, Paddle-Paddle, SenseTime Technology SenseParrots, Tencent TNN, Ali MNN, ByteDance BytePS, Megvii MegEngine, Xiaomi Mace and other domestic artificial intelligence development frameworks and application ecosystems to achieve rapid development, Paddle developers have exceeded 8 million; Baidu ERNIE Bot, Alibaba Cloud Tongyi Qianwen Huawei Pangu, iFLYTEK Spark and other 11 large model products have passed the record.
"Artificial intelligence, represented by the big model, is accelerating its deep integration with the real economy, empowering thousands of industries, giving birth to new business models of the digital economy, and showing a strong’head goose ‘effect. Healthcare, education, finance, transportation, manufacturing, energy and other fields have become the most active areas of commercial application of artificial intelligence technology." Wang Lei said that by improving the quality of social public services and enhancing the efficiency of social governance, artificial intelligence continuously meets the needs of the people for a better life, and enhances the people’s sense of gain and happiness.
In Ding Minglei’s opinion, artificial intelligence has become an important driving force for technological innovation, industrial upgrading and productivity improvement, and it is increasingly integrated into the whole process of economic and social development, which has a significant and far-reaching impact on economic development and social progress.
The digital economy continues to empower
"Developing the digital economy is a strategic choice to grasp new opportunities in a new round of technological revolution and industrial transformation. Deepening the innovative application of digital technology and continuously spawning new industries, new business models and new models is an important breakthrough point for making China’s digital economy bigger, better and stronger," Ding Minglei said.
Looking to the future, Ding Minglei believes that the digital economy will unleash greater potential for China’s economic and social development. A series of new "Internet +" economic formats have been born one after another. Cloud computing and industrial Internet have become important driving forces for the digital transformation of enterprises. Large-scale Internet platform enterprises continue to empower the real economy through technologies such as the Internet, big data, cloud computing, and artificial intelligence; digital consumption continues to release the potential of residents’ demand; digital technology has also largely freed themselves from time and space restrictions, and the development of new trade models such as digital trade has smoothed the domestic and international economic cycle.
"In order to maximize the empowering effect of digital economic innovation and promote high-quality economic development, the next step should be to accelerate the implementation of top-level design, optimize the business environment of the digital economy, and stimulate and protect entrepreneurship." Wang Lei said.
In Ding Minglei’s view, to accelerate the empowering role of digital technology in economic development, one is to accelerate the promotion of digital industrialization and industrial digitalization, especially to realize the deep integration of the digital economy and the real economy, and further release the digital dividend and build a modern economic system. The second is to use digital technology applications to empower common prosperity, break the barrier of time and space, improve the inclusive level of limited resources, and promote the equalization of education, medical care, and services. The third is to support leading technology enterprises to give full play to market demand, integrate innovation, and organize platform advantages through digital transformation, integrate and gather innovative resources, improve China’s industrial basic capabilities and the modernization level of the industrial chain, and add more vitality for the economy to move towards high-quality development. The fourth is to continue to promote the deep integration of the digital economy and the real economy, guide the digital transformation of small and medium-sized enterprises, fully tap the development potential of the industrial Internet, and promote new generation information technologies such as artificial intelligence and big data to empower equipment, assign value to enterprises, and empower industries.