The Government Work Report this year explicitly stated in the section on "Further Expanding High-Level Opening Up" the need to "guide enterprises in optimizing their global market layout." It also proposed guiding the rational and orderly cross-border layout of industrial and supply chains, improving comprehensive overseas service systems, and strengthening risk prevention and control for outbound investment along with the protection of overseas interests.
In recent years, the overseas expansion of Chinese enterprises has become a powerful trend. Relevant data shows that in 2025, amidst a complex and changing external environment, China's full-industry outward foreign direct investment reached $174.4 billion, a year-on-year increase of 7.1%. The total value of overseas mergers and acquisitions was $43.6 billion, a year-on-year increase of nearly 40%, achieving rapid growth.
A wave of corporate overseas expansion in a country is the result of the combined effect of the spillover of endogenous capabilities and external strategic demands after its economic development reaches a specific stage. The prerequisite is that domestic enterprises have acquired the ability to export capital, technology, and management standards globally. From the perspective of world economic history, corporate overseas expansion signifies a country's leap from being a "capital-importing country" to a "capital-exporting country."
**Embarking on Systematic Global Expansion**
Looking back at the history of Chinese companies going global, before 2008, the main entities expanding overseas were primarily central state-owned enterprises, focused on acquiring overseas oil fields and mineral rights to meet and secure rapidly growing domestic resource demands. After the 2008 international financial crisis, the devaluation of overseas assets presented an opportunity that Chinese companies seized, triggering the first wave of overseas expansion. On one hand, they increased acquisitions of resource-based companies. On the other hand, manufacturing enterprises pursued overseas mergers and acquisitions to acquire technology, brands, and channels, such as Geely's acquisition of Volvo. Concurrently, some private enterprises invested in overseas real estate, hotels, cinemas, and sports clubs, primarily focused on capital operations. The essence of this phase was companies "going out to buy things" under specific capital and asset conditions, rather than "going overseas to build factories and open stores" to sell their own products.
In 2015, China successively released the "Vision and Actions on Jointly Building the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st-Century Maritime Silk Road" and the "State Council Guiding Opinions on Promoting International Cooperation in Production Capacity and Equipment Manufacturing." Guided by the Belt and Road Initiative, the pace of corporate overseas expansion accelerated significantly. In the same year, China's outward foreign direct investment flow reached $145.67 billion, while foreign capital actually utilized was $135.6 billion, making China a net capital exporter for the first time. Since then, Chinese companies' overseas investments began to focus on synergy with national strategy, with large-scale expansion in infrastructure, energy, and production capacity cooperation, shifting from single-point mergers and acquisitions to systematic layout.
Over the past five-plus years, Chinese companies' overseas expansion has entered a new era of actively seeking global layout. After per capita GDP surpassed $10,000 for the first time in 2019, the structure and quality of outward investment underwent fundamental changes. This is both an inevitable choice driven by changes in domestic supply and demand dynamics, companies proactively capturing overseas market opportunities, and building global brands, and a natural spillover resulting from the accumulated advantages of domestic industrial chains, possessing the ability to export capital, technology, and brands globally. At the same time, some deglobalization measures adopted by Europe and the US have led to a restructuring of the global supply chain system, also prompting Chinese companies to diversify their production capacity layout. In this phase, characterized by technology premiums, brand exports, and global resource allocation, Chinese companies are engaging in "systematic global expansion." While capturing high-value-added segments of the global industrial chain, they have also become an emerging force driving economic globalization.
**"Innovation Premium" and the Advantage of a Mega-Scale Market**
The large-scale overseas expansion of Chinese companies benefits firstly from the leap in international competitiveness brought by the "innovation premium." China is the only country in the world with all industrial categories according to the UN industrial classification, and the systemic efficiency and innovation capability of its industrial ecosystem have taken shape. It can be said that in traditional industries not present in developed countries, China has an absolute advantage; in high-tech fields typically dominated by developed countries, China has begun to become an active participant and leader in some frontier sectors. Currently, China has achieved breakthroughs in areas such as smart vehicles, new energy, 5G communications, artificial intelligence, and drones, with its share of global production capacity exceeding 40% in multiple industrial sectors.
Over the past decade, Chinese companies have led the global green transformation wave. Represented by companies like
Simultaneously, innovation capabilities in China's TMT (Technology, Media, and Telecommunications) and consumer sectors are driving the number of private enterprises' outward investments to surpass those of state-owned enterprises. Technology infrastructure like Tencent Cloud and Alibaba Cloud is accelerating their overseas expansion. Companies like
The enhancement of China's innovation capability is rooted in the advantages of application scenarios and rapid iteration capabilities within its domestic mega-scale market. The ability for enterprises to refine products and undergo intense competition within a massive market in a short period constitutes a uniquely advantageous "innovation ecosystem." This ecosystem allows Chinese companies to "fail fast, iterate quickly" in new fields and efficiently advance the commercialization of technology. As this model continues to exert force across various sectors, the honed competitiveness will form a significant advantage in the international market.
**Broad Space Provided by Emerging Markets**
The large-scale overseas expansion of Chinese companies also benefits from the "dividend of the era" created by changes in the international landscape. Currently, the rapid economic development of emerging markets provides vast space for Chinese companies going global. IMF data shows that in the past year, Asian economies contributed over 60% to global economic growth, while the G7's share of global GDP has dropped from about 70% in the 1990s to around 30% in 2025 (calculated by purchasing power parity).
The industrialization, urbanization, and digitalization processes in emerging nations have spawned explosive incremental demand for power and infrastructure, production equipment, and durable consumer goods. Chinese companies can provide cost-effective solutions for the infrastructure, industrial production equipment, and mass consumer goods involved in meeting these demands. China, leveraging the Belt and Road Initiative and deepened regional cooperation, has promoted the "effective matching" of this potential supply and demand.
ASEAN has become the most concentrated region for Chinese corporate investment abroad. The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) has accelerated the deep integration of industrial and supply chains between China and ASEAN. With its large, young population and strong development aspirations, Chinese companies are not only participating in regional infrastructure construction and promoting manufacturing relocation but are also actively establishing footholds in cross-border e-commerce, mobile gaming, and entertainment consumption. Africa, with its relatively nascent but rapidly developing market形态, also holds immense opportunities, attracting Chinese investment in infrastructure and minerals, while traditional manufacturing, new energy, and digital communications industries are also actively participating in Africa's development.
Currently, the global economy is accelerating its shift towards intelligent transformation. Following its leadership in green energy, China has also ranked among the world's frontrunners in AI technology and application. Smart terminals like AI PCs, AI phones, smart homes, and AI glasses have achieved mass adoption domestically. Intelligent computing infrastructure like Huawei Cloud and Alibaba Cloud is accelerating its global layout. Chinese open-source AI models like DeepSeek and Seedance are welcomed by global developers. Currently, among the top five models globally by invocation volume, China holds four spots, surpassing American models in calls. The characteristics of many large US models being non-open-source and high-cost make it difficult for them to compete with low-cost Chinese open-source models in emerging markets, while China's iteration across various AI application scenarios is accelerating. In the future, the advantages of Chinese intelligent technology and applications will have broad development space in the vast emerging markets, becoming the theme of the next wave of overseas expansion.
**Supporting "Capability Spillover" with Systematic Services**
The large-scale overseas expansion of Chinese enterprises is, in essence, a profound "capability spillover" – a manifestation that these enterprises have developed the capability to participate in high-level international competition in terms of technological accumulation, management experience, and brand building. For this "spillover" to proceed more steadily and go further, it requires the government to provide escort through "service capabilities."
In October 2025, five departments including the Ministry of Commerce jointly issued the "Guiding Opinions on Further Improving the Comprehensive Overseas Service System," and on February 11, 2026, launched the National Comprehensive Overseas Service Platform. This platform aims to provide "one-stop" public services for 52,000 overseas enterprises, hundreds of thousands of foreign trade enterprises, and thousands of overseas contracted project and labor cooperation enterprises. This marks a new stage of "institutional escort" for China's comprehensive overseas services.
Through policy coordination, financial support, and diplomatic布局, the Chinese government is systematically paving the way for enterprises going global, promoting the deeper integration of Chinese capital, technology, and brands into the restructuring process of the global industrial landscape. More critically, on the stage of global economic governance, China is transitioning from a rule-taker to a rule-shaper, participating with a more proactive posture in constructing an institutional environment and market order conducive to the participation of Chinese enterprises in global development.
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