China’s IT industry in coming five years

BEIJING, CHINA: The new-generation information technology is recognized as a pillar industry among China’s emerging strategic industries. Meanwhile, it also ranked high among the seven emerging strategic industries in the gazette of the Fifth Plenum of the 17th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China in Oct. 2010. Thus, the new-generation information technology industry has gained an important position during the period of the 12th Five-Year Plan.

The new-generation information technology industry is closely connected with the IT industry, and they are complementary to each other. It is because the new-generation information technology industry mainly consists of the next generation communications network, Internet of things, cloud computing, tri-networks convergence, new display devices, high-performance IC, high-end software and server, which cover the key technologies and major markets of the IT industry in the fields of computer technology, communications technology and sensor technology.

While new technical breakthroughs continue to meet the increasing market demand, new demand also continues to stimulate innovations of related technologies. It is observed that the new-generation information technology is guiding the development of the IT industry, serving as an important breakthrough point of industrial upgrade and a continuous drive for the prosperity of the IT industry.

Therefore, the new-generation information technology’s high-speed development has brought opportunities to the IT industry. With the launch of supportive government policies and measures, China’s electronic information industry will face a favorable policy environment, and the industry is about to enter another fast-growing five, and even ten years.

In the face of the future leap of the emerging strategic industries, the IT industry is obliged to take the following measures. Firstly, the IT industry should have a sound understanding of the policy trends and comply with the state’s industrial guidance to develop related information technologies in the fields of energy-saving and environmental protection, new energy and new materials.

With regard to the industrial layout, the IT industry should coordinate with the development of the emerging strategic industries, with a focus on meeting its urgent demand. Secondly, enterprises of the IT industry should be able to identify the market demand. New enterprises and new demand are set to arise with the great development of the emerging strategic industries.

Therefore, the IT enterprises will have to pay close attention to the development of the emerging strategic industries in order to provide supporting products and services for their informatization. Thirdly, the IT industry should enhance its independent innovation capabilities and try to achieve breakthroughs in key fields and technologies.

The development of China’s emerging strategic industries is not supposed to heavily depend on the introduction of foreign technologies for informatization supports, so China’s IT industry should have the courage to take on this mission. At present, the independent innovations of the IT industry still faces many problems, such as the enterprises’ weak innovation capabilities, lack of core technologies, an incomplete policy and regulation system to facilitate the market access of new technologies and products, and poor supports for innovative start-ups in terms of investment, financing and fiscal policies and mechanisms.

The IT enterprises should play a dominant role in accelerating the convergence of industrialization and informatization in new emerging industries, helping emerging strategic industrial companies acquire the informatization tools and achieve green and sustainable development. To be specific, the IT enterprises should pay close attention to the development trends of emerging strategic industries, promptly identify the IT application demand of the emerging strategic industries, track the development of cloud computing, Internet of things, other new technology and application fields, and meet the expanding informatization demand of the emerging strategic industries with innovative technologies, products and services.

It should be noted that, the IT enterprises will face more challenges when providing informatization services for the new emerging industries compared to that for the traditional industries. The emerging strategic industries consider significant technology breakthroughs and significant development demand as the fundamentals, which means that the informatization of emerging strategic industries will be bound with new industries, new markets, new enterprises, new technologies and new business processes.

The traditional industries’ experience in informatization may not apply to the emerging industries. The informatization of those emerging strategic industries requires more than IT system integration and industrial software application.