China's electronic info manufacturing profits surge in first three quarters: official

China's electronic information manufacturing sector saw profit surge in the first three quarters, as 5G and AI continue to power high-quality industrial development, a Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) official said Tuesday.

Data from the MIIT showed that in the first three quarters, the electronic information manufacturing sector sustained high-speed growth in revenue and profits. The industry's value-added growth reached 15.8 percent, 10.3 percentage points higher than the overall industrial value-added growth during the same period.

From January to August, the sector achieved a business revenue of 12.8 trillion yuan (about 1.92 trillion U.S. dollars), up 20.1 percent year on year, and total profits of 847.5 billion yuan, surging 109.9 percent year on year. Its contribution to the profit growth of all industrial enterprises above designated size reached 62 percent.

"Innovation in hot areas such as AI remains highly active, becoming the main driver of industrial growth. In the third quarter, more than 20 new AI-powered mobile phones and computers were launched. Flagship products have acquired on-device autonomous task execution capabilities, marking a shift of AI terminals from passive response to active service," said Xie Cun, director general of the Information and Communications Development Department of the MIIT.

According to MIIT data, the information and communication industry maintained stable development in the first three quarters. The total volume of telecommunications services increased by 7.3 percent year on year, and internet business revenue grew by 8.9 percent year on year from January to August.

Domestically, 5G and industrial internet are empowering all sectors of the economy, and foreign investment access to telecommunications services is steadily opening up, according to Xie.

"Infrastructure capabilities have been steadily enhanced. A total of 5.254 million 5G base stations have been built, with the coverage of 5G-Advanced networks gradually expanding. Pilot deployments of 10-gigabit optical networks have been realized in residential communities, factories, and industrial parks. In terms of computing power facilities, by the end of September 2026, China's intelligent computing power scale had reached 2,592 EFLOPS, a year-on-year increase of 146 percent, strongly supporting the rapid development of China's AI industry," said Xie.

EFLOPS is a unit of measurement for a computer's speed. A 1 EFLOPS computing system can complete 1 quintillion floating-point operations per second.

Xie also noted that China continues to promote the integration of 5G and industrial internet into all sectors. Currently, 5G technology has been integrated into all 97 major categories of the national economy, and the industrial internet covers all 41 major industrial categories, with more than 26,000 industrial 5G private networks and 1,260 5G factories built.

China's electronic info manufacturing profits surge in first three quarters: official

As China marks the 90th anniversary of the victory of the Long March, a roughly 12,500-kilometer military odyssey, German writer Christian Y. Schmidt shared his and fellow author Volker Haering's extraordinary cycling journey retracing the the historic route with local audiences in Germany.

The Long March (1934-1936) was a military maneuver by the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army that later became a defining episode in modern Chinese history, symbolizing endurance and perseverance as troops crossed some of the country's harshest terrain to establish a new revolutionary base. Some marched as far as 12,500 kilometers, enduring hunger, thirst and cold.

Schmidt and his friend, fellow writer Haering spent 138 days between 2023 and 2024, cycling nearly 7,000 kilometers along the historic route of the Chinese Red Army, starting from Ruijin County in east China's Jiangxi Province and heading northwest.

Their experiences have been compiled into a book titled "Der lange Fahrrad-Marsch: 7.000 Kilometer durch das Reich der Mitte".

Last week, Schmidt shared extraordinary journey with audiences at the Confucius Institute at Dusseldorf, drawing engagement from local attendees seeking fresh perspectives on Chinese modern history.

"I think we can take away an inspiration from this: As long as you keep moving forward, never give up, and always keep your eyes fixed on your goal, you will surely be able to keep going. And if you encounter difficulties along the way, you just have to find ways to overcome them," said Schmidt.

The presentation prompted reflections on endurance and modern development among the German audience.

"Mao Zedong once said, 'Nothing is impossible in the world if you dare to scale the heights.' I think this is precisely the spirit demonstrated during the Long March. Who could have imagined that after enduring such hardship, victory could still be achieved in the end? I think that is the lesson we can draw from it. In a sense, the memory of the Long March seems deeply etched into the genes of future generations," said Kneppel, an attendee.

"China's development is indeed nothing short of a miracle. China has achieved astonishing leaps in technological development. Driven by the government, China displays tremendous vitality, focus, and purposeful effort. The Chinese government unites people from all over the country to march toward the exact same goal, and I have witnessed this with my own eyes," said Maria, another attendee.

German writer shares 7,000 km Long March cycling journey with audiences