H3C issued 2018 White Paper of Digital Economy Index for Cities in China: Shanghai, Shenzhen and Beijing are acting as the Pacesetters 《Huanqiu.com》

On “H3C Navigate 2018” Summit held on March 30, the digital economy research institute of New H3C Group (H3C) under Unisplendour Corporation Limited issued 2018 White Paper of Digital Economy Index for Cities in China (2018 White Paper). By providing accurate sketch about the status of digital economy in 100 cities and insights and advice in the viewpoint of city governors, the 2018 White Paper aims to offer better reference for decision making for governments and enterprises and help cities in different development phases to explore transformation path of the digital economy under new trend.

H3C officially issued 2017 White Paper of Digital Economy Index for Cities in China in the first session of the Navigate Summit in April 2017. As the first white paper discussing and evaluating status about the digital economy in cities of China, it gives in-depth analysis to 40 cities, arousing extensive attention and affirmation in related industries. The 2018 edition enlarged the amount of cities to 100. From the 2018 White Paper, the development pattern of China’s digital economy is “Three Centers and Four Hot Spots”. It also advises to regard data as the core production element to advance digital economy in urban regions, build integrated and sharing service platform of city level, enhance the coordinated development of cities and industries, thus achieving comprehensive and balanced growth of the digital economy.

Digital Economy Sketch of Cities in China

The 2018 White Paper has optimized the evaluation system of China’s urban digital economy index, enriched and deepened the definitions of such four first-class indicators as data and information infrastructures, urban services, urban governance, and industrial integration as well as another twelve second-class indicators, and highlighted the value of database, construction achievement, and industrial economy. Based on the evaluation system, the 2018 White Paper selected 100 cities as the targets from 338 candidates according to related economy size, population, political status, and regional radiation capacity. At last, the 100 cities have been classified into “leaders”, “pursuers”, “emerging members”, “awakening members”, and “watchers” of the digital economy.

According to the 2018 White Paper, “leaders” represented by Shenzhen, Shanghai, Beijing are enjoying balanced growth and pioneering advantages; “pursuers” of Ningbo, Wuxi, Guiyang, Qingdao, and Chongqing have obtained leading advantages or made breakthroughs in key fields, enjoying the potential to be listed in “leaders”; such “emerging members” of Mianyang, Shenyang, Changzhou, Kunming, and Zhuhai have achieved initial success in digital economy and are about to start fast development; “awakening members” have already recognized the importance of digital transformation and taken off; “watchers” have weaker foundation for digitalization and are still in the phase of exploration.

The White Paper also points out that two new digital-economy ecosystems of “centers” and “hot spots” have already taken shape in cities of China, with the three centers of Yangtze River Delta, Pearl River Delta, and Circum-Bohai-Sea region as well as the five hot spots of Sichuan Basin, Central China Plain, southeast of Fujian, the Central Shaanxi Plain, and Shandong Peninsula, all enjoying remarkable regional coordinated development. Among them, the “centers” have seen the digital economy of two-way coordinated and complementary development; “hot spots” are experiencing unipolar breakthrough. For example, Chengdu acts as the highland and critical point of Sichuan Basin regarding digital economy.

Advice to develop digital economy in cities of China

Referring to the 2018 White Paper, the development levels of cities of different tiers in China have significant differences, and the imbalance between urban services and urban governance is prominent. Regarding data and information infrastructures, the gap of information infrastructures with hardware as the core is gradually reducing, while data-based difference has started to taken shape.

Based on all related phenomena and conditions existing in the construction of urban digital economy, the 2018 White Paper advises city governors to take data as the core, rearrange the internal and external production factors, and build a new model of urban development. As the foundation of urban digital economy, all cities need to construct a unified and shared service platform to encourage more enterprises and industries to open data, use data, and share data, thus releasing the new kinetic energy of digital economy. In addition, it also advocates all cities to focus on not only realizing intelligentized, elaborated and service-oriented industrial subjects through digitalization but also the deep integration of cities and industries driven by the digital economy, thus forming a new regional economy ecosystem and promoting the realization of digital China.