Beijing sets out plan to lead China's AI drive

Beijing doubled down on its ambitions to lead China's AI drive on Friday, unveiling the "Beijing Solution" at the 2025 Artificial Intelligence Computing Conference.

Backed by more than 30 firms, including China Mobile and IEIT Systems, the "Beijing Solution" is aimed at turning the national "AI+" strategy into tangible industry gains.

Endorsed by three municipal bodies, the initiative revolves around a super-node innovation consortium. The idea is to pool strengths from system providers, large-model developers and application companies to build "industry intelligent bodies", that is AI systems tailored for specific fields. Organizers describe it as moving from "national core" to "national application", ensuring breakthroughs in labs are translated into real-world use.

The model builds on a 2024 computing cluster consortium that made progress in system interconnection. With fresh companies on board, Beijing hopes to quicken cross-industry collaboration and widen the range of AI-driven solutions.

At the center of this push are intelligent bodies, which officials call the backbone of the "AI+" plan. These systems demand far greater computing power than today's large language models, with token usage projected to explode a hundred million-fold by 2030. Super-node servers—machines built from tightly linked AI cores— are seen as the only way to handle that scale, offering both speed and capacity.

The "Beijing Solution" will apply that infrastructure to sectors like healthcare, education, manufacturing and robotics, bridging what policymakers call the "last mile" between advanced research and everyday industry use. The goal is to make AI tools available not just to tech giants, but to companies across the economy.

Beijing already has a head start. In 2024, its AI core industry output hit 350 billion yuan ($49 billion). The city counts 159 registered large models, nearly a third of the national total and is home to more than 2,400 AI firms, including half of China's unicorn start-ups.

The rollout comes a month after the State Council issued its opinions on implementing the "AI+" action, a national plan to embed AI into six major industries by 2027.

That document set ambitious targets for the adoption of smart systems while also calling for more open cooperation on innovation.