Li Qiang Touts AI and Future Industries in Shanghai
Chinese Premier Li Qiang called for deepening the integration of artificial intelligence with advanced manufacturing and for cultivating “future industries” during a research and inspection tour of Shanghai on 22 September, according to People’s Daily. The visit, reported by Xinhua, aimed to assess regional progress and translate central policy into local implementation.
Li, a Politburo Standing Committee member and head of the State Council, said China must combine its strengths in manufacturing and digital-intelligent technology to build “smarter industrial and supply chains.” The tour followed the National Conference on Advanced Manufacturing, held in Beijing on 16–17 September, and reiterated guidance from General Secretary Xi Jinping.
Two Stops, Two Priorities
At the Shanghai Electric National AI Application Pilot and Testing Base, Li inspected specialized and industrial robots, reviewed their use in complex scenarios, and toured an intelligent robot assembly and debugging pilot workshop. He heard briefings on “AI+” integrated service providers and the construction of AI-native factories.
According to the state report, Li said AI and other emerging technologies are “profoundly reshaping the technical systems, production models and industrial forms” of manufacturing. He urged the country to advance “AI + manufacturing,” promote full-process intelligent upgrading of R&D, production and management, and “further activate the potential of data elements.”
He also emphasized support for smaller firms, calling for more manufacturing service platforms built around industrial design, pilot testing and intelligent operations. These, he said, should help “all kinds of enterprises, especially SMEs, carry out intelligent transformation more efficiently and at lower cost.”
His second stop, the Shanghai Future Qidian Community, is a science and technology incubation platform focused on future industries. Li reviewed the innovation ecosystem and the operation of the Shanghai Future Industry Fund, examined technology products in brain-computer interface and quantum computing, and spoke with researchers and community staff.
Patient Capital and the Future-Industry Blue Ocean
Li described future industries as “a potential blue ocean for advanced manufacturing,” calling for stronger tracking of frontier technologies, breakthroughs in core technologies, and an environment that “encourages bold exploration and tolerates trial and error.”
Acknowledging the long growth cycles and high market risks of such sectors, he said China must “vigorously develop venture investment, expand patient capital, and establish a mechanism for increasing investment and sharing risks in future industries.” He closed his remarks with a line on human capital: “Talent is the primary resource; only by possessing talent can one win the future.”
Shanghai Party Secretary Chen Jining and State Councilor and Secretary-General Wu Zhenglong accompanied the tour.
The Shanghai Model Behind the Message
The Qidian Community is no ordinary incubator. Launched in September 2025 at the Pujiang Innovation Forum, it is guided by the Shanghai Municipal Science and Technology Commission and jointly founded by the Shanghai Future Industry Fund, under state-owned Shanghai International Group, and two top-tier scientist communities. Its backers describe it as a “super connector” linking scientists, entrepreneurs and investors across fields such as AI, advanced nuclear energy, life sciences, brain-computer interface, quantum computing and silicon photonics, according to Shanghai International Talent Net.
The fund powering it has become a template for state-backed frontier investing. Shanghai Securities News reports its total scale at RMB 15 billion, structured as 15-year-cycle counter-cyclical “patient capital” wholly financed by the Shanghai municipal treasury. As of 30 April 2026, it had made direct investment decisions on 30 projects, and in June it proposed investing in two more sub-funds on top of three announced in May.
The visit is consistent with a broader national push. CCTV, via China Youth Net, noted that the National Conference on Advanced Manufacturing set the “intelligentization, greening, integration” direction for the 15th Five-Year Plan, which began in 2026. The plan sets targets including 500 zero-carbon factories and raising green-factory output to 45 percent of above-scale manufacturing value by the plan’s end.
Analysis: A Coordinated Signal
Li’s Shanghai itinerary is a follow-through, not an isolated gesture. In May 2026, he made a comparable tour in Beijing, visiting firms including Xiaomi Auto and the Beijing Humanoid Robot Innovation Center under the same theme of deepening AI-advanced manufacturing integration. The repetition suggests a coordinated national campaign to commercialize frontier technology rather than a one-off local inspection.
The choice of Shanghai is telling. The city’s 15th Five-Year Plan outline identifies six future-industry fields — future manufacturing, information, materials, energy, space and health — with agile bets on quantum technology, brain-computer interface, controllable nuclear fusion, bio-manufacturing, 6G, ultra-wide bandgap semiconductors, brain-like intelligence, and deep-sea and deep-space development. By touring both a mature industrial base and a frontier incubator on the same day, Li endorsed the full pipeline from applied AI to speculative science.
His emphasis on “patient capital” also reflects a governance argument about who should finance high-risk, long-horizon technology. The Shanghai fund’s 15-year horizon and public funding are explicitly designed to avoid the profit constraints of private venture capital, allowing it to back “from 0 to 1” breakthroughs. Other regions are following suit: Beijing, Chengdu and Hunan have all recently set up or expanded future-industry funds.
Coverage of the tour in domestic media was uniformly official, drawn from the Xinhua transcript, with no critical or independent analysis published. That absence itself carries a signal: the policy direction is settled, and the debate is now about execution.
What to Watch
Li’s remarks set expectations for how the 15th Five-Year Plan’s manufacturing agenda will be operationalized — through AI-enabled factories, specialized industrial robots, and state-anchored investment in frontier sectors. The next tests will be whether the patient-capital model can demonstrate commercial traction, whether SMEs can genuinely access low-cost intelligent upgrading, and how Shanghai’s future-industry pipeline translates into viable companies. For now, the message from Shanghai is that China’s manufacturing upgrade will be led by the state, financed patiently, and pointed squarely at the technological frontier.