Experts in attendance at the 2024 (23rd) China Internet Conference in Beijing, held from July 9 to 11, reviewed the development of the internet in China over the past three decades and projected future trends in the sector.

China officially joined the global internet community in 1994 with the launch of a 64k-bandwidth dedicated circuit, becoming the community’s 77th nation to do so. Through 30 years of arduous exploration and innovation, the internet in China has achieved leapfrog developments, characterized by improvements of both quality and quantity in infrastructure, breakthroughs in technological industries, deeper integration of applications, increasingly sound governance environments, and expanding international cooperation.

Particularly since the 18th CPC National Congress, China’s internet sector has continuously broken new ground, ranking first in many key indicators. Zhao Zhiguo, chief engineer at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, stressed that over the last 30 years, the Chinese internet industry has fully leveraged the strengths of the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics. It has not only created a model marked by government guidance, market services, leadership by top enterprises, and the synergistic development of production, education, research, and application, but also achieved major breakthroughs in technological innovation capabilities by upholding the driving role of innovation and technological self-reliance.

Mobile communications in particular have made historic strides, evolving from following the 2G trend, to breaking through 3G technology, keeping pace with global 4G developments, and now leading in the 5G era, Zhao noted. The internet industry has strengthened its overall capabilities, achieved global leadership in the industrial scale of communications, and established a comprehensive industrial chain that encompasses systems, terminals, chips, and other links.

Regarding infrastructure, China’s broadband network size and coverage are among the world’s largest and most extensive, said Shang Bing, president of the Internet Society of China (ISC). To date, the fixed broadband household penetration rate has reached 110.2%, over a quarter of users have gigabit connections, 5G base stations total 3.837 million, and more than 90% of administrative villages nationwide are connected to the 5G network. The continually refined backbone network architecture has created a landscape of comprehensive interconnectivity. At present, China also has over 8.1 million standard racks in use at data centers, ranking second globally in terms of total computing power.

“The industrial internet is the second half of the internet game,” said Wu Hequan, an academician from the Chinese Academy of Engineering. He observed that artificial intelligence is driving the integration of the digital and physical worlds, enhancing the internet’s ability to connect with physical objects and support vertical industries. AI is not only advancing industrial digitalization but also fueling digital industrialization and the broader development of the internet sector.

Looking ahead, Shang underscored the need to consolidate the lead in basic networks, strengthen technological innovation capabilities of the internet industry, improve the pattern of integrated and innovative development, and deepen high-standard opening up and collaboration. Regarding technological innovation, he called for efforts to expedite hardware innovation like AI chips and algorithmic frameworks, and construct an autonomous ecosystem dominated by large models, thereby accelerating the formation of new quality productive forces.

The conference was hosted by the ISC.