The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the National Development and Reform Commission and five other departments have jointly issued an action plan to promote coordinated development of large, medium and small enterprises in the platform economy during the 2026-28 period. The plan proposes developing synergies in innovation, ecosystems and openness among enterprises of different sizes; stimulating the creativity and competitiveness of the platform economy; and promoting deeper integration of the real economy and the digital economy. 

The new action plan demonstrates a shift in the focus of China's platform economy policy, from regulation and preventing monopolies to promoting collaboration and common development and strengthening innovation. The core concept running through the action plan is the promotion of coexistence and win-win outcomes within the platform economy, helping participants avoid zero-sum interactions, which is seen as necessary for the industry to move forward toward high-quality development.

The platform economy, economic activities conducted on digital platforms, originated in the Silicon Valley in the United States in the mid-1990s. While individual platform economies exist around the world, the platforms with the greatest global influence are mainly concentrated in a few countries such as the United States and China.

As the platform economy plays a significant role in promoting innovation and entrepreneurship, driving industrial upgrading and fostering new growth drivers, in recent years, China has introduced a series of measures and policies to promote the innovative and sound development of the platform economy, including in the 15th Five-Year Plan (2026-30). According to figures from iiMedia Research, the market size of China's platform economy reached 25.2 trillion yuan ($3.7 trillion) in 2024, with e-commerce, the sharing economy and online education becoming the main sectors of growth.

However, data monopolies, vicious competition and big data-enabled price discrimination have become major market disorders hindering the healthy growth of the platform economy. To address these problems, the Chinese Government has issued a number of policies. Currently, China's platform economy is at a critical stage of transformation and upgrading from relying on quantity to focusing on quality. The recent action plan, jointly issued by the seven departments, directly targets key issues, such as deepening the governance of algorithms and traffic, calling on platforms to reduce charges and promoting technology and data sharing.

The three major initiatives in the action plan are innovation synergy, ecosystem synergy and openness synergy. Innovation synergy encourages platforms and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to establish collaboration on innovation, allowing the technology foundations of large enterprises to be integrated with the micro-innovation capabilities of SMEs. Ecosystem synergy regulates platform fees and rule-making to ensure fair competition for SMEs. Openness synergy guides the sharing and openness of computing power, data and other resources with SMEs. These three initiatives essentially establish a benefit-sharing mechanism with large enterprises setting up the platforms and SMEs sharing the platforms. Platforms will achieve longer lifespans due to the thriving of the ecosystem, while SMEs will be able to reach their innovation potential by accessing resources at a lower cost, resulting in mutual empowerment and success.

Of course, a good policy blueprint needs detailed supporting measures for implementation. Whether platforms are willing to share resources that SMEs need, whether the threshold for SMEs to access platform resources is truly lowered and whether there is third-party oversight of algorithm governance will all determine whether coexistence and win-win outcomes will be achieved. There is no doubt that for the platform economy to gain long-term prosperity, it must not be just an arena for winners, but a thriving, diverse ecosystem like a symbiotic tropical rainforest.

Copyedited by G.P. Wilson 

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