China's 15th Five-Year Plan targets over 30 trillion yuan in electronics manufacturing revenue by 2030

By Li Yanzheng | Infographic by Guo Chenkai

The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) and the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) have jointly released the "15th Five-Year Plan for the Development of the Electronic Information Manufacturing Industry" (hereinafter referred to as the "Plan"), setting a target for the industry's revenue from enterprises above a designated size to exceed 30 trillion yuan by 2030.

Industry experts believe that artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping the growth logic of the entire sector. The Plan places AI as a central theme, aiming to drive China's electronic information manufacturing industry from "scale leadership" toward "systemic leadership."

Seizing the AI Development Opportunity

The Plan emphasizes seizing opportunities in AI development, strengthening the AI foundation, and accelerating innovation across the entire chain of the electronic information manufacturing industry. Key targets by 2030 include:

• R&D investment intensity reaching 3.5%
• Emergence of long-board technologies and products in areas such as integrated circuits, advanced computing, consumer electronics, basic electronics, and energy electronics
• Formation of globally competitive world-class enterprises
• Significant improvement in the security level of the industrial and supply chains
• Substantial growth in computing power supply capacity
• Notable increase in the adoption rate of next-generation intelligent terminals
• Advancement in intelligent, green, and integrated development

According to Ao Li, Vice President of the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT), the revenue scale and export share of China's electronic information manufacturing industry have ranked first among 41 industrial categories for 13 consecutive years. Major products such as mobile phones, microcomputers, and color TVs have long held the top global position in output.

"Transforming scale advantages into systemic advantages, and shifting from 'quantitative leadership' to 'qualitative superiority,' is a major proposition for the development of the electronic information manufacturing industry during the 15th Five-Year Plan period," Ao Li said. He noted that the Plan deploys tasks across four dimensions—foundation building, chain strengthening, new growth cultivation, and sustainability—as a systematic response to the needs of this new stage.

Xiang Ligang, Chairman of the Zhongguancun Information Consumption Alliance, pointed out that the industry's average annual revenue during the 14th Five-Year Plan period was approximately 15 trillion yuan, reaching about 17 trillion yuan in 2025. The target of 30 trillion yuan by 2030 represents a growth rate far exceeding that of traditional industries, highlighting China's immense potential in high-tech fields.

Five-Pronged Approach to Full-Chain Innovation

To achieve these goals, the Plan prioritizes full-chain innovation breakthroughs, deploying efforts in five directions:

1. Deepening integrated circuit advancements
2. Upgrading electronic components and materials to higher-end levels
3. Enhancing smart sensor capabilities
4. Achieving breakthroughs in specialized equipment and instruments
5. Pioneering frontier areas in the photonics industry

The Plan places significant emphasis on the materials sector. In Xiang Ligang's view, materials, energy, and information form a mutually supportive "iron triangle." Advanced materials such as diamond hold revolutionary significance for the entire information industry and AI technology. He noted that the Plan not only identifies the broad direction of AI but also finds specific pathways for breakthroughs through materials, reflecting a combination of virtual and physical approaches.

Liang Linjun, an expert from the CAICT's Institute of Industrial Economics, highlighted three bottlenecks currently constraining the sustained growth of computing power:

• The "memory wall" —where processor computing power growth has long outpaced storage bandwidth growth
• The "power wall" —driven by increasing computing density
• Constraints on large-scale cluster interconnection bandwidth

These bottlenecks are accelerating hardware innovations such as high-bandwidth memory (HBM), liquid cooling, and high-speed optical interconnects, which are precisely the core issues the Plan's foundation-building direction aims to address.

Strengthening the AI Hardware Foundation

Once the foundation is solidified, where will growth come from? The Plan outlines four emerging directions:

1. Consolidating advantages in the energy electronics industry
2. Promoting the development of the spatiotemporal information industry
3. Strengthening the AI hardware foundation
4. Accelerating the integration of digital intelligence technologies in industry-specific electronics

Energy electronics is the first focus area. The Plan specifies advancing the iterative upgrade of high-efficiency crystalline silicon photovoltaic cell technology, developing next-generation high-efficiency photovoltaic technologies such as perovskite tandem cells, along with supporting equipment and materials, and expanding "photovoltaic+" application scenarios.

Liu Weijun, Co-founder of Guangyin Technology, told reporters: "Perovskite tandem cells are regarded as the direction for next-generation photovoltaic technology. As core bottlenecks such as stability and large-area preparation are gradually overcome, perovskite is expected to enter the stage of large-scale production within the next three to five years."

Even more promising is AI hardware. The Plan proposes continuously driving the iterative upgrade of products such as AI smartphones, personal computers, smart glasses, and audio-visual terminals, while broadening their application scenarios.

Xiang Ligang said the Plan's logic for "cultivating new growth" is clear: new growth points do not emerge from nowhere but grow out of existing industrial advantages, realizing value at the intersection of technological breakthroughs and scenario implementation.