{"id":11560,"date":"2023-01-23T07:30:12","date_gmt":"2023-01-23T07:30:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focus.cbbc.org\/?p=11560"},"modified":"2025-04-23T09:34:23","modified_gmt":"2025-04-23T09:34:23","slug":"how-did-zhongguancun-become-chinas-silicon-valley","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focus.cbbc.org\/how-did-zhongguancun-become-chinas-silicon-valley\/","title":{"rendered":"How did Zhongguancun become China’s Silicon Valley?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Zhongguancun is the birthplace of some of China\u2019s (and the world\u2019s) biggest tech companies, including Lenovo, Bytedance \u2013 the company behind Tiktok \u2013 and Didi. But what role does \u2018China\u2019s Silicon Valley\u2019 have to play in the future of the country\u2019s tech sector?<\/h2>\n

Anyone involved in tech in China has probably visited Zhongguancun,\u00a0 the major technology hub in Beijing\u2019s Haidian District that\u2019s been dubbed \u2018China\u2019s Silicon Valley\u2019. The area\u2019s scientific origins date back to the 1960s, during China\u2019s nascent atomic programme. In later years, thanks to its close proximity to many of the capital\u2019s premier universities, Zhongguancun became home to famous names including Lenovo, Baidu, ByteDance, and more.<\/p>\n

Ning Ken is a Beijing-based writer and journalist who has long been fascinated by Zhongguancun. His recent book, Zhong Guan Village: Tales from the Heart of China’s Silicon Valley<\/em> (ACA Publishing, 2022 and translated by James Trapp) looks at the origins of the area from the viewpoint of a fascinated novelist, the story of some of the big names that have established themselves there, and some musings on what the \u2018village\u2019 means to the future of China\u2019s technology sector. Paul French caught up with Ning Ken to talk tech, Zhongguan village and how one goes about telling its stories.<\/p>\n

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Can you just tell us where Zhongguancun is and how it came to be known as \u2018China\u2019s Silicon Valley\u2019?<\/h4>\n

In 1949, Zhongguancun was a small village in the northwest of Beijing, near the Old Summer Palace, Peking University, Tsinghua University, and several other famous universities. At that time, there were only a few dozen farming families living there. In the 1950s, the government decided to establish a \u2018science city\u2019 in Zhongguancun. It would be a university town, under the encouragement of the government. The campuses were mostly packed into the northwest of Beijing, with eight colleges along a narrow road called Xueyuan Road. In addition, the first batch of scientific research institutes and the Chinese Academy of Sciences were established. Consequently, Zhongguancun has become one of the most talent and knowledge-intensive areas in the world, laying the foundation for its claim to be the \u201cSilicon Valley of China\u201d.<\/p>\n

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You decided to visit and explore this \u2018capital of innovation\u2019 on the edge of your hometown of Beijing. What excited you about the place and what did you find when you first went there?<\/h4>\n

The idea of Zhongguancun becoming China\u2019s Silicon Valley emerged after the reform and opening up era began. First, Zhongguancun seized the opportunity in the early 1980s offered by Deng Xiaoping\u2019s reforms. They built an \u201cElectronics Street\u201d that I was excited to see at the time. Then they created the high-tech industrialisation zone that became the progenitor of many other high-tech zones in China. Since then, Zhongguancun has continually seized the opportunity of the emergent knowledge economy and become an important base for national scientific and technological economic innovation. Secondly, Zhongguancun offered tech firms preferential treatment, not least allowing them to locate in the political centre of China \u2013 Beijing \u2013 and collaborate with the dozens of colleges and universities and hundreds of scientific research institutions nearby.<\/p>\n