"Guangdong has become the top employment destination for Peking University graduates outside of Beijing, and Shenzhen has become their preferred city outside the capital," shared Zhang Jin, Member of the Standing Committee of the Party Committee and Executive Vice President of Peking University, on December 27th at the opening of the 2025 "Million Talents Converge in Southern Guangdong" Autumn Mega Job Fair. This statement serves as a snapshot of the year-round effectiveness of the talent initiative. By November, the "Million Talents Converge in Southern Guangdong" campaign had organized over 5,000 recruitment events, attracting graduates from more than 1,000 universities online and offline; over 1.1 million talents chose Guangdong, meaning 1 in every 12 of China's 12.22 million new graduates opted to build their careers in the southern province, offering a modern reinterpretation of the "Peacock Flying Southeast" phenomenon seen during the early years of reform and opening-up.
From December 27th to 28th at the Shenzhen Convention and Exhibition Center (Futian), the "Million Talents Converge in Southern Guangdong" initiative hosted its major year-end recruitment event. Centered on the theme "Gathering Talents in Guangdong, Meeting the Future," the fair brought together 1,825 key employers releasing over 65,000 premium job positions, attracting registrations from more than 120,000 students across over 1,700 domestic and international universities. Notably innovative, the fair debuted a "Lead Firm Zone," where eight lead firms including BYD Company Limited, Gree, TENCENT, XPeng Inc., and China Southern Power Grid recruited alongside over 80 of their supply chain partners. Capitalizing on the 2026 APEC summit's location in Shenzhen, the fair also featured an "APEC Talent Matchmaking Service Zone," focusing on the recruitment needs of foreign-invested enterprises from APEC member economies and Chinese companies expanding overseas. "Many company details unavailable online can be efficiently communicated and filled in on-site, which is very helpful for me personally in finding the right position, broadening my horizons, and for my future career planning and development," said Lin Wenlong, a master's graduate from Sun Yat-sen University.
As the year-end highlight of Guangdong's "Million Talents Converge in Southern Guangdong" action plan, this job fair saw coordinated efforts from all 21 cities in the province, creating a talent-attraction matrix covering all industries, the entire province, and complete industrial chains, and gathering 1,825 key employers including listed companies, specialized and sophisticated SMEs, universities, and research institutes. Observations revealed consistently crowded booths at leading enterprises. Over 40 Fortune Global 500 companies, such as Huawei, TENCENT, and BYD Company Limited, brought core positions; for instance, BYD released multiple roles including Senior Mechanical Engineer, Algorithm Engineer, and Vehicle Integration Engineer, with single positions hiring up to 20 people, no work experience required, and monthly salaries ranging from 17,000 to 40,000 yuan, making them relatively friendly to new graduates. "Since BYD began recruiting fresh graduates in 1998, the practice has never stopped. In the past three years alone, we have recruited over 50,000 fresh graduates, with master's and doctoral degree holders accounting for 70%. Half of the general managers I directly supervise have grown from fresh university graduates," discussed Wang Chuanfu, Chairman and President of BYD Company Limited.
The newly established "Lead Firm Zone" became a major attraction. Eight renowned lead firms, including BYD Company Limited, Gree, TENCENT, XPeng Inc., and China Southern Power Grid, led the way, recruiting alongside over 80 of their upstream and downstream supply chain enterprises, collectively showcasing talent demand across the entire industrial chain. Among them, the "TENCENT ecosystem" included exhibitors like Tencent Cloud Technology, Tencent Music, and WeBank; BYD's "chain" included firms like BYD Precision Manufacture, BYD Semiconductor, and Fudi Technology; XPeng Inc. also attended with recruitment needs spanning its new energy vehicles, robotics, and flying car business units. "XPeng mobilized 13 upstream and downstream partners to participate in this job fair, offering nearly 1,000 positions. Job seekers' application interest is very strong, with hundreds of inquiries and submissions at our booth in less than two hours," introduced Dong Hanyu, HR Director of Guangzhou Xiaopeng Motors Technology Co., Ltd., adding that showcasing the entire chain from software/hardware development to production, manufacturing, and sales helps candidates understand the lead firm's full scope and allows companies to find better-suited talent.
The "APEC Talent Matchmaking Service Zone" also drew significant attention. With the APEC Economic Leaders' Meeting scheduled for November 18-19, 2026, in Shenzhen, the job fair gathered 34 foreign-invested enterprises from APEC economies operating in Guangdong and Chinese companies aiming to expand overseas, offering premium positions targeting foreign and returnee talents. Shenzhen-based Seavo Technology, which developed mainland China's first X86 motherboard and now serves several humanoid robot companies, exemplifies this trend. Mo Ben, Chief Recruitment Officer at Seavo Technology, noted that amid the global AI wave, the company has substantial demand for international talent from hardware/software R&D to overseas expansion, having recruited outstanding graduates from Oxford, NYU, NUS, and other foreign talents in recent years. "The APEC summit in Shenzhen is an excellent opportunity for corporate recruitment. To better embrace the AI wave and opportunities, we will intensify our efforts to attract high-end international talent over the next year or two," Mo Ben said.
Over the past year, the "Million Talents Converge in Southern Guangdong" 2025 multi-city recruitment tour covered 19 provinces (municipalities) nationwide, visited over 100 key universities, and promoted over 500,000 premium jobs. Continuing this collaborative momentum, the fair featured a "Hundred Schools Gather in Southern Guangdong" zone, inviting over 180 universities from outside the province to participate as a group, culminating in the on-site signing of over 30 government-university-enterprise cooperation projects and facilitating immediate signings between more than 30 employers and graduates, showcasing the fruits of local-institutional collaboration. "Guangdong has become the top employment destination for Peking University graduates outside of Beijing, and Shenzhen has become their preferred city outside the capital," revealed Peking University's Zhang Jin, noting that nearly a thousand PKU graduates annually choose employment in Guangdong, over 70% of whom work in Shenzhen; nearly half of the graduates from the Peking University Shenzhen Graduate School remain in Guangdong for work, with close to 80% of those staying in Shenzhen. Zhang Jin mentioned that since March, Guangdong province and its cities have visited PKU ten times to organize "Million Talents" series events. Moving forward, PKU will deepen strategic cooperation with Guangdong and Shenzhen, using the Shenzhen Graduate School as a link, focusing on talent collaboration, and jointly promoting the deep integration of scientific and technological innovation with industrial innovation to contribute significantly to Guangdong's new advantages and breakthroughs.
Guo Chunsheng, Director of the Student Employment and Entrepreneurship Guidance Center at Shandong University, explained that as a comprehensive university with strengths in arts, sciences, medicine, and engineering, and recent additions like the Inspur School of Artificial Intelligence and the Low-Altitude Science and Engineering School, Shandong University's offerings align well with the Greater Bay Area's, particularly Shenzhen's, dominant industries. The collaboration between Shandong University and Shenzhen's Guangming District to establish a "University Student Employment and Entrepreneurship Workstation" aims to build a bridge connecting Shandong University talent with the industrial needs of the Guangming Science City. "Guangdong is not only an economic center of China but also a major global economic center. We very much hope that outstanding Shandong University graduates can find their own career paths in Guangdong," Guo Chunsheng said.
Official data shows that by November, the "Million Talents Converge in Southern Guangdong" initiative had held over 5,000 recruitment activities, attracting participation from graduates of more than 1,000 universities online and offline, resulting in over 1.1 million talents choosing Guangdong; among China's 12.22 million new graduates, one in twelve began the next chapter of their lives in Southern Guangdong.
