Over the course of five years, marked by unwavering determination, Changzhou's industrial scale has surged from 1.34 trillion yuan to 2.22 trillion yuan, achieving a historic leap with core indicator growth leading southern Jiangsu. Throughout this period of navigating through challenges, the city's manufacturing growth trajectory has been reshaped, forging the robust framework of its "1028" industrial system: the traditional industrial base has been consistently consolidated through systematic upgrades, advanced manufacturing clusters have fostered industrial synergy, and artificial intelligence alongside future industries are gaining momentum through forward-looking strategies.

This industrial report card from Changzhou during the "14th Five-Year Plan" period vividly embodies the city's strategic choice of "acting after careful planning and achieving enduring success." Within this systematic restructuring centered on industrial structure, technological innovation, and urban competitiveness, impressive macroeconomic data paints a vivid picture of a "New Changzhou" taking shape. Industrial sales revenue reached 2.22 trillion yuan in 2025, a net increase of 880 billion yuan from the 1.34 trillion yuan at the end of the "13th Five-Year Plan," accumulating a growth of 65.7% over five years. Output value of enterprises above designated size hit 1.72 trillion yuan in 2025, up 620 billion yuan from 1.1 trillion yuan at the end of the "13th Five-Year Plan," representing a cumulative growth of 56.4% with an average annual rate of 9.4%.

Value-added from industries above designated size grew at rates of 13.6%, 9.2%, 8.8%, 7%, and 4.6% from 2021 to 2025, accumulating a total increase of 51.1% with an average annual growth of 8.6%. Industrial electricity consumption surpassed 51.4 billion kilowatt-hours in 2025, a 28.7% increase from 40 billion kilowatt-hours at the end of the "13th Five-Year Plan," with an average annual growth of 5.2%. The share of manufacturing value-added in GDP remained consistently above 40% throughout the "14th Five-Year Plan" period. Industrial investment grew at an average annual rate of 6.5% during this period.

Over five years, the total increment of 880 billion yuan in Changzhou's industrial scale is equivalent to adding the industrial volume of a medium-sized city. Looking back, the answer lies in an early-moved piece on the "industrial chessboard": the city pioneered the nation's first full-chain new energy ecosystem spanning "generation, storage, transmission, application, and grid integration," with over 3,400 industrial chain enterprises clustering into groups, achieving 97% industrial chain completeness and an industrial scale exceeding one trillion yuan. More than 7,000 industrial enterprises above designated size have solidified the foundation, 315 specialized and innovative "little giant" enterprises are accelerating their growth, and high-tech industry output value accounts for over 60% of total industrial output value above designated size.

Now, targeting a new goal of 3 trillion yuan by the end of the "15th Five-Year Plan," Changzhou is placing its new bets on "Artificial Intelligence +" — leveraging new technologies to find the next exit for traditional manufacturing approaching its ceiling. Observing the industrial chessboard over the past five years, the most direct manifestation is the 880 billion yuan increment in industrial scale — equivalent to an average annual net increase of one medium-sized city's industrial volume. This means that while many manufacturing cities nationwide struggled through transformation pains, Changzhou, a southern Jiangsu city contributing 8% of GDP with only 4% of the province's area and 6% of its population, completed a weighty and impressive leap during the "14th Five-Year Plan" period.

This five-year leap cannot be discussed without the keyword — new energy. Back in 2013, when Changzhou's automobile industry was still in a state of "overall low grade," the city had already listed new energy vehicles and key components as the core of its "ten major industrial chains" for cultivation. In 2016, Li Xiang, founder of Li Auto, secured workshop space and financing support from Wujin District based on a "three-page PPT" presentation; by 2019, Li Auto's Wujin plant was operational, while BYD signed agreements to build a facility in Xinbei. In hindsight, this resembles a carefully orchestrated "industrial chess game."

Changzhou pioneered the nation's first full-chain new energy ecosystem involving "generation, storage, transmission, application, and grid integration," and has cultivated it deeply — from green photovoltaics, new-type energy storage, and smart grids to new energy vehicle applications and industrial resource recycling, with each link efficiently connected. The city has gathered over 3,400 industrial chain enterprises including CALB, SVOLT, and Jiangsu Times, achieving local supporting for the four core raw materials of power batteries — cathodes, anodes, separators, and electrolytes — with 97% industrial chain completeness, ranking first nationwide. By 2025, this layout paid off significantly: the new energy sector's industrial scale exceeded one trillion yuan, reaching 1,047.9 billion yuan; new energy vehicle production surpassed 810,000 units; power battery sales revenue exceeded 220 billion yuan, up 19.1% year-on-year; one in every ten new energy vehicles exported nationwide was produced in Changzhou; transformer output accounted for 13% of the national total, establishing the country's largest UHV power transmission and transformation equipment manufacturing base, and the city was selected as a national pilot city for comprehensive electrification of public sector vehicles.

With new energy as a breakthrough, Changzhou, a traditional "industrial star city," began redefining its manufacturing sector with a clearer development logic: not merely developing an industry, but building an industrial ecosystem. Transitioning from single-point breakthroughs to holistic prosperity of the industrial ecosystem, and from constructing a modern industrial system to cultivating world-class advanced manufacturing clusters, Changzhou has reshaped its industrial competitive capability through the "1028" industrial system. Since the "14th Five-Year Plan," the city has accelerated the construction of this system, promoting the "145" industrial pattern of ten major clusters. The new energy vehicle and auto parts cluster achieved nearly 500 billion yuan in output value above designated size; intelligent equipment, new materials, new energy, and new-type power equipment clusters each exceeded 100 billion yuan; while five clusters including new-generation electronic information, biotechnology and new-type medical devices, digital information industry, energy conservation and environmental protection, and high-end textile and apparel each surpassed 50 billion yuan.

National-level clusters have emerged successively: the new carbon materials cluster, the Yancheng-Changzhou-Suqian-Huai'an photovoltaic cluster, the Sunan special steel materials cluster, and the Yangtze River Delta (including Jiangxi) large aircraft cluster — four clusters led or co-built by Changzhou — have been selected as national advanced manufacturing clusters. Additionally, four industries including Liyang's power batteries, Xinbei's new energy vehicle electrical equipment, Jintan's energy electronics, and Wujin's industrial collaborative robots have been included in national SME characteristic industrial clusters. The Xinbei China-Switzerland SME Cooperation Zone was also listed among national Sino-foreign SME cooperation zones.

If new energy represents Changzhou's most successful industrial breakthrough over the past five years, then the rapid growth of high-tech manufacturing has expanded the city's future growth space. Data shows that in 2025, high-tech industry output value accounted for over 60% of total industrial output above designated size, an increase of more than 12 percentage points from the end of the "13th Five-Year Plan." Meanwhile, traditional industries such as textile and apparel, chemicals, metallurgy, and building materials accounted for 23.1% of the city's total industrial output above designated size in 2025, down 7.2 percentage points from the end of the "13th Five-Year Plan." Amid this shift between old and new growth drivers, industries such as artificial intelligence, robotics, new-generation electronic information, and bio-manufacturing are assuming new roles, granting the urban economy greater resilience during manufacturing restructuring.

The manufacturing foundation is upgrading toward intelligent and green directions. The city achieved a "zero breakthrough" in world "lighthouse factories" and national-level intelligent factories, cumulatively building 3 world lighthouse factories, 8 national excellence-level intelligent factories, and 21 national 5G factories. National green factories, green industrial parks, and green supply chain enterprises increased from 22, 2, and 2 respectively at the end of the "13th Five-Year Plan" to 59, 8, and 30, representing significant growth. The explosion of the manufacturing "foundation" ultimately comes down to enterprises. Over five years, Changzhou's industrial enterprises above designated size surpassed 7,000, a net increase of over 2,300, constituting the "foundation" of the city's industrial economy. Enterprises with revenue exceeding 100 billion yuan grew from 1 to 2, while those exceeding 10 billion yuan increased from 11 to 26.

The traction effect of leading enterprises is particularly evident. Since BYD's arrival in Changzhou in 2019, its first-phase base has accumulated output value exceeding 170 billion yuan; in 2025, BYD's Changzhou base achieved an overall production and sales milestone of 100 billion yuan, with over 60% of products exported to Europe, Japan, Southeast Asia, and other regions. Leveraging BYD's leading role, Changzhou High-tech Zone has gathered over 2,000 chain enterprises, with regional new energy industry chain enterprise output reaching 130.36 billion yuan in 2025. Beyond leading enterprises, single champion and specialized "little giant" enterprises are also strengthening industrial resilience. National manufacturing single champions increased from 18 at the end of the "13th Five-Year Plan" to 45, ranking third in the province; national specialized "little giant" enterprises surged from 12 to 315, with an average annual increase of over 60. Easpring, which settled in Changzhou in 2018, has had its independently developed ultra-high nickel products certified by automakers including Volkswagen and BMW; ArcelorMittal's soft magnetic materials project in Changzhou is expected to reduce logistics and warehousing costs by 15%-20% and shorten order delivery cycles by over 10%.

More importantly, the innovation ecosystem has taken shape. Changzhou's high-tech enterprises have achieved doubling, and high-value invention patents per 10,000 people are 2.6 times the level at the end of the "13th Five-Year Plan." The city has been selected among the nation's top ten cities for high-quality manufacturing development and has consistently been rated as a national benchmark city for business environment — these "soft strengths" are becoming key variables in attracting continued enterprise investment.

Standing at the new starting point of 2.22 trillion yuan, Changzhou is accelerating its pace. In February 2026, the city convened a conference on advancing modern industrial system construction with a clear goal: to strive for the city's total industrial scale to reach the 3 trillion yuan level by the end of the "15th Five-Year Plan." From 2.22 trillion to 3 trillion yuan implies another 800 billion yuan leap. If the trajectory from 1.34 trillion to 2.22 trillion yuan proved manufacturing resilience over five years, then the path from 2.22 trillion to 3 trillion yuan poses another question: with traditional manufacturing approaching its ceiling, how can new technologies inject fresh vitality into industry?

Changzhou's answer is to bet on "Artificial Intelligence +". At the start of 2026, the city released an "AI +" action plan, proposing to accelerate the construction of a national demonstration city for "intelligent agents + scenario applications." Policy documents including the "Action Plan for Promoting High-Quality AI Development in Changzhou (2024-2027)" clarify the development direction and pathways. Focusing on the integration of "AI +" with the real economy, enterprises are racing ahead: at Li Auto's welding workshop, "process silicon-based agents" can optimize thousands of welding parameters in seconds; at Hualida's intelligent factory, full-chain digitalization enables the fastest 20-day journey from design to finished garments. Targeting the strategic goal of "striving for AI core industry scale to exceed 40 billion yuan by 2028," Changzhou has established a clear framework. Building upon the deepened "1028" industrial system, the city is committed to forging a more distinctive key industry matrix, advancing manufacturing toward intelligence, green development, and integration, and fully promoting AI empowerment of new-type industrialization. It is accelerating the construction of a green manufacturing system, deeply integrating technological innovation with industrial innovation, and achieving coordinated progress across the upstream, midstream, and downstream sectors.