Chinese central SOEs vow to break tech bottlenecks with higher investment: officials

China's State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council (SASAC) said on Friday that Chinese centrally administered state-owned enterprises (SOEs) will step up investment in sci-tech innovations to make breakthroughs in solving "bottleneck" problems for greater contribution to accelerating the country's high-level sci-tech reliance and building the country into a sci-tech giant.

By acting in line with the resolution adopted at the third plenary session of the 20th Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, we will concentrate resources to boost centrally administered act as the main force in developing new quality productive forces, Wang Hongzhi, deputy head of the SASAC, said at a press conference in Beijing on Friday.

By comprehensively implementing the new type of national system with concentrated efforts and resources for important events or projects, the SASAC will firmly invest in fields that feature long research and development (R&D), high investment and other types of enterprises are unwilling to participate, Wang said.

China has stepped up efforts to boost the innovation prowess of its state firms. These SOEs promote the high-end, intelligent and green development of traditional industries while accelerating the building of a systematic layout for strategic emerging industries.

The R&D investment of central SOEs expanded by 14.5 percent on average each year from 2016 to 2020. In the past two years, their annual investments have exceeded 1 trillion yuan ($140 billion) and notable achievements have been made in aerospace, deep-sea exploration, energy and transportation, Wang said.

In 2023, investments in strategic emerging industries surged by 32 percent year-on-year and the revenue exceeded 10 trillion yuan for the first time, Wang said, noting that the control and influence of SOEs in key fields have further increased and new advantages are being formed at an accelerated pace.

Next, efforts will be made to improve institutional rules for cooperation between SOEs and other types of enterprises. Meanwhile, the administration will encourage SOEs to share innovation resources and give full play to the advantages of various kinds of enterprises to deepen cooperation and achieve mutual development, Lin Qingmiao, another official with the SASAC, said at the same conference.

Guided by the direction of a new round of technological revolution and industrial reform, the SASAC will make centrally administered SOEs play a demonstration role in this round of large-scale renewal of equipment, Liu Shaowei, another official with the SASAC, said at the same conference.
Liu said centrally administered SOEs plan to invest a total of 3 trillion yuan in this regard over the next five years.