Banks Shift Tech Finance from 'Planting Trees' to 'Cultivating Forests': Need to Cross Cognitive Threshold and Build Ecosystem Synergy

As the first of the “five major articles” proposed at the Central Financial Work Conference, sci-tech finance shoulders the historic mission of supporting innovation-driven development and nurturing new productive forces. At the critical juncture of the start of the “15th Five-Year Plan” period, as China’s industrial structure accelerates its upgrade to higher levels, the model by which financial institutions serve sci-tech enterprises is undergoing a profound transformation.

In the past few years, financial institutions focused more on credit allocation to individual sci-tech projects or single enterprises—akin to “planting trees” in the wilderness. Today, faced with the complex and ever-changing financial needs of tech enterprises across their full life cycles, the industry urgently needs to shift toward systematic deployment and multi-agent collaboration, advancing to the stage of “cultivating forests”—building a vibrant sci-tech finance ecosystem.

Recently, at the 2026 Financial Institutions Annual Conference and Banking Annual Conference hosted by Securities Times, a roundtable dialogue titled “From ‘Planting Trees’ to ‘Cultivating Forests’: Writing the First Major Article” resonated deeply with the industry. Moderated by Wang Jian, Assistant Director of the Research Institute at Guosen Securities, the discussion brought together Fan Yu, Deputy General Manager of the Sci-Tech Finance Department at China Merchants Bank; Song Longfeng, Deputy General Manager of the Sci-Tech Finance Department at SPD Bank; and Wang Wei, Deputy General Manager of the Inclusive Finance Department at Ping An Bank. They engaged in an in-depth exploration of the underlying logic, organizational coordination, and industry competition in sci-tech finance.

Reshaping the Logic: Crossing the Cognitive Threshold of Sci-Tech Finance

The shift from “planting trees” to “cultivating forests” is not merely an expansion of service scale but a fundamental change in underlying logic. According to the panelists, this marks the official transition of banking sci-tech finance from Version 1.0 to Version 2.0.

“The move from sci-tech finance 1.0 to 2.0 is a shift from doing business to building an ecosystem. The most visible change lies in the service targets and service methods,” said Wang Wei. In the past, banks focused on individual enterprises. Today, they must not only serve enterprises but also understand entrepreneurs and the broader industrial ecosystem behind them. Service methods must also expand from pure loan provision to comprehensive, full-life-cycle services including settlement and investment.

However, this transition is no easy task. It poses unprecedented challenges to bankers’ industrial insight.

Fan Yu noted that from “planting trees” to “cultivating forests,” the first hurdle banks must overcome is the “cognitive capability threshold.” Traditional bank credit relies heavily on balance sheets, income statements, cash flow statements, and collateral. But modern sci-tech enterprises iterate rapidly and often operate with light assets or even losses in their early stages.

“Take innovative drug companies in the biopharmaceutical industry, for example. Their pipelines may only be in Phase I or II clinical trials, with no net profit or revenue. How can a bank assess their financing value?” Fan emphasized that the biggest challenge for banks is shifting evaluation criteria from “looking at the three financial statements” to “looking at technology, market赛道, and competitiveness.” Traditional yardsticks cannot be used to measure modern tech enterprises.

Beyond the cognitive threshold, restructuring risk mechanisms and coordination models is equally critical. Song Longfeng argued that the core underlying issue in moving from “planting trees” to “cultivating forests” is “coordination.” In the past two years, banks have focused on single-point “tree planting.” Now that the trees have grown into a forest, internal and external ecological barriers must be broken.

Fan Yu agreed, pointing out that the transition requires breaking down “information silos” among venture capital, industrial parks, government agencies, and securities firms, transforming them into tightly connected “information links.” It also requires the joint participation of government funds and guarantee institutions, using the power of the entire ecosystem to nurture sci-tech enterprises.

Breaking Down Barriers: Building an Internal and External Collaborative Ecosystem

To truly shift from “individual combat” to “ecosystem collaboration,” commercial banks must make substantive changes to their organizational mechanisms. In recent years, several banks have established first-level specialized departments for sci-tech finance, aiming to break down departmental silos from the top down and reshape internal production relations.

On the internal mechanism front, both China Merchants Bank and SPD Bank shared their practical experience in restructuring. Fan Yu introduced that CMB has established a “big sci-tech” concept, forming a cross-departmental “Tech+” working group at the bank-wide level. Corporate banking, investment banking, industry research, risk control, and subsidiaries work together to achieve “one bank, one strategy.”

SPD Bank has also optimized its organizational structure. Song Longfeng explained that in early 2024, SPD Bank established a headquarters-level Sci-Tech Finance Department and set up a dedicated task force at the group level to drive innovation in products, models, organizational structure, and service systems.

“Through this model, SPD Bank has connected the frontline insights of sci-tech sub-branches, the M&A capabilities of investment banking, and the wealth management of private banking, achieving integrated, relay-style services across the group,” Song said.

In terms of external ecosystem linkages, each bank has unveiled differentiated “levers.”

Song summarized SPD Bank’s approach as a “commercial banking + investment banking + ecosystem” model, covering multiple dimensions including equity, debt, loans, insurance, leasing, incubation, matchmaking, and alliances. “SPD Bank has not only built the ‘Sci-Tech Living Room’ as a regular industry-finance ecosystem brand—now held 2,000 times, reaching over 100,000 enterprises—but has also launched tailored service plans for four core partners: government, universities, industrial parks, and venture capital.”

According to Song, to effectively support frontline staff, SPD Bank has innovatively launched a digital intelligence tool called the “Five Radars,” covering technology, industry, policy, parks, and funds, helping ecosystem partners and customer managers accurately assess enterprise value.

Ping An Bank, meanwhile, has made technology empowerment a key breakthrough in serving small and micro sci-tech enterprises. Wang Wei said that under its “Six Strategies in One” framework (integrating customers, products, policies, channels, and risk), Ping An Bank has deployed a “1+12+N” organizational structure. For early-stage, asset-light tech enterprises, Ping An has introduced intellectual property scoring and expert evaluation mechanisms in product design, and uses AI-powered assistants to provide convenient, fast, and low-cost financing channels for small and micro tech enterprises.

Breaking Out of the Rat Race: Toward Differentiation and Relay-Style Coexistence

As more financial institutions enter the sci-tech finance赛道, concerns about homogeneous competition and credit “price wars” have emerged. From the perspective of ecosystem “forest cultivation,” how can the industry avoid involution and achieve sustainable development?

“The biggest pain point is whether our frontline staff can truly understand what these little-known ‘hidden champions’ are doing,” Wang Wei said bluntly. She believes that to escape pure price competition, bank customer managers must transform into “tech industry experts” who can genuinely assess the value of technology. At the same time, Ping An Bank leverages the comprehensive financial advantages of its group to provide full-life-cycle companionship, including investment-loan linkage, replacing single low-price credit competition with professional, in-depth comprehensive services.

Facing peer competition, Fan Yu offered a broader ecological perspective: “Among banks, what we most hope to see is an avoidance of ‘involution-style’ competition. We hope each bank can leverage its own resource endowments to carve out a differentiated path in serving tech enterprises.”

He noted that different banks have different resource endowments and can find their own positioning within the ecosystem: some banks focus on industry chain leaders, while others excel at serving small and micro enterprises. Using CMB as an example, he said the bank has a massive retail customer base of 230 million and a strong retail service foundation, enabling it to provide public-private coordinated support for tech enterprises.

Beyond inter-bank relationships, the relationship between banks and venture capital/private equity firms is also one of “relay-style coexistence.” Fan Yu stated that VC/PE and banks complement each other, with equity capital and bank credit providing diversified, relay-style financing paths for tech enterprises.

Song Longfeng further called for moving ecosystem collaboration from “alliance initiatives” to “normalized mechanisms.” He suggested that the industry jointly build evaluation standards so that the “soft power” of tech enterprises can be universally converted into “hard credit” across the industry. At the same time, underlying data should be shared under compliance conditions, making the data foundation a public infrastructure for the sci-tech finance ecosystem.

A Shared Vision: Cultivating the Forest Together

“The best time to plant a tree was ten years ago. The second-best time is now. And the best way to cultivate a forest is for everyone to do it together,” Song Longfeng concluded at the end of the roundtable, capturing the shared sentiment of all participants.

“Sci-tech finance is a strategic priority for the country during the ‘15th Five-Year Plan’ period. Planting trees and cultivating forests are not choices—they are mandatory tasks. A single tree cannot make a forest. Cultivating the forest is our ultimate goal,” Fan Yu said. Wang Wei also expressed hope that, against the backdrop of national strategy, policy subsidies, and risk compensation, all industries could join hands to connect small forests into a vast woodland.

From single-point “tree planting” to ecosystem “forest cultivation,” there is no shortcut in the advancement of sci-tech finance. Only by breaking down barriers, deepening collaboration, and adhering to long-termism can financial institutions, amid this magnificent transformation of old and new growth drivers, jointly nurture a thriving Chinese sci-tech “great forest.”