- The province has the most companies on both national rankings for R&D spending and invention patents
- The results highlight Zhejiang’s shift from manufacturing-led growth toward technology-driven innovation
Zhejiang once again topped China’s rankings of private companies by research spending and invention patents, underscoring the province’s growing strength in technology-intensive industries.
The All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, a top national private-business body, released its 2026 rankings on September 9 in Wenzhou.
Zhejiang had 97 companies on the R&D spending list and 115 on the invention-patent list, the most of any province on both rankings.
The entry threshold rose to 481 million yuan in annual R&D spending and 216 valid domestic invention patents, respectively.
The 97 Zhejiang companies on the R&D list spent a combined 261.6 billion yuan on research, while the 115 companies on the patent list held 133,474 valid domestic invention patents.
Huawei and Tencent ranked first and second nationally for R&D spending, followed by Alibaba. Geely Holding and Ant Group also made the top 10.
More deep-tech
This year’s new entrants included a stronger group of semiconductor companies.
Silergy (矽力杰), Axera (爱芯元智) and Maxio Technology (联芸科技) entered the R&D ranking for the first time, while JoulWatt (杰华特) and Forehope Electronic (甬矽电子) joined the invention-patent list.
Advanced equipment, new energy and energy storage also produced new entrants based in Zhejiang.
The trend reflects a broader shift in Zhejiang from “follower” innovation toward technology-led competition.
The ‘415X’ initiative
One driver is Zhejiang’s “415X” advanced manufacturing program, which focuses government and industrial resources on four trillion-yuan-scale manufacturing clusters, 15 100-billion-yuan clusters and a pipeline of smaller emerging industries.
In the first half of 2026, companies in these advanced manufacturing clusters spent 188.5 billion yuan on R&D, up 8.5% year on year.
But policy support is only part of the story. Zhejiang’s private firms are increasingly moving from scale-driven growth toward sustained R&D investment as a way to build technological barriers.
A model of public-private synergies
For overseas entrepreneurs and investors, the province offers a model of how government industrial policy and private-sector innovation can reinforce each other.
Zhejiang has also directed more than 80% of investment from a provincial dedicated fund toward private-sector projects.
The result is a growing pool of so-called “three-high” companies — high-tech, high-value and high-growth businesses — as Zhejiang tries to turn its manufacturing depth into a more durable advantage in the tech age.
The province, where private firms accounted for 67% of its GDP in 2025, has historically been a hothouse of private-sector innovation.
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