On August 26, the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone marked its 46th anniversary.

From “building a new floor every three days” to “processing an order every second,” and from the “World Factory” to the “Innovation Rainforest” —this vibrant city, jointly crafted by the Party and the people following China’s reform and opening-up, shoulders the responsibilities of the era as a pioneering exemplar, serves the broader interests of the nation and the province, showcases the institutional advantages of socialism with Chinese characteristics, and writes a vivid chapter of Chinese-style modernization along the coast of the South China Sea.

In October 2020, at the celebration ceremony marking the 40th anniversary of the establishment of the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone, General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized that Shenzhen should effectively build itself into a pioneering demonstration zone for socialism with Chinese characteristics and set an exemplary model for cities aspiring to become a modern socialist power.

Over the past six years, Shenzhen has steadfastly upheld the directives entrusted to it, leveraging a pioneering spirit, a drive for innovation, and a pragmatic work ethic to further deepen reform and opening-up, elevate its development capacity, and enhance the well-being of its citizens—its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) surged from RMB 2.77 trillion in 2020 to RMB 3.87 trillion by 2025; during the same period, the share of the added value of strategic emerging industries in the city’s GDP rose from 37.7% to over 43%, while the share of R&D investment in GDP increased from 4.93% to 6.5%, and the number of National High-Tech Enterprises grew from 18,600 to 26,000; furthermore, Shenzhen has ranked first among all Chinese cities in the number of PCT international patent applications for 22 consecutive years.

In less than 100 days, the 33rd Informal Meeting of APEC Leaders will kick off in Shenzhen. As the host city, Shenzhen is positioning itself as a global benchmark city, coordinating the preparation for this significant event with its pursuit of high-quality development, and showcasing the vibrant panorama of Chinese modernization to the world through the city’s proactive efforts.

Enhancing openness and quality. The city’s competitiveness continues to rise.

At the Huaqiangbei electronics market, merchants of diverse backgrounds gather around AI glasses and drones to inquire about pricing; during peak hours, the daily number of international visitors exceeded 8,000. At the Longgang Robotics 6S store, tourists from the Caribbean shake hands and take photos with humanoid robots; within just one year since its opening, the store has welcomed nearly 250,000 international visitors… Openness is becoming an integral part of Shenzhen’s daily life—in a way that’s right at everyone’s fingertips.
These internationalized vignettes of the streets are merely a prelude. In November, Shenzhen will host the 33rd Informal Meeting of APEC Leaders – marking the third time China has served as APEC host, and the first time in 12 years.
The phrase “host city” represents a myriad of concrete preparations for any given city; for Shenzhen, its “APEC period” has long since evolved from a mere preparatory phase into an integral part of the city’s daily operations.
Shenzhen International Airport’s flight network covers all major APEC economies; its Comprehensive Service Center for International Visitors enables international passengers to complete all payment, cultural and tourism, telecommunications, and immigration procedures in a single stop upon arrival.
The citywide bilingual signage system has been upgraded, with over 40,000 foreign-language signage installations having been properly renovated. The city is home to more than 4 million registered volunteers; among them, key volunteers proficient in multiple languages have successively completed international service training programs, extending the “Shenzhen Warmth” to every corner of the city.
The venues and events are all ready. The Shenzhen International Exchange Center has officially opened; the APEC Forestry Ministers’ Meeting was successfully held at this venue, serving as a warm-up event for larger-scale multilateral gatherings.
An international event serves as a window into a city’s openness and openness-driven character. In the first half of this year, Shenzhen’s GDP reached RMB 1,984.348 billion, representing a year-on-year growth of 5.8% and maintaining its leading position among China’s first-tier cities. During the first seven months of the year, Shenzhen’s foreign trade continued its strong growth trajectory, with its total import and export volume exceeding RMB 3.3 trillion. The actual utilization of foreign direct investment surpassed RMB 32 billion, marking a year-on-year increase of over 50%; among this amount, capital flowing from APEC member economies accounted for 93.6%.
Capital votes with its feet, while enterprises place orders with their hands. In the first half of this year, multinational corporations—including U.S.-based AMD and South Korean Future Group—successively established R&D centers in Shenzhen, casting a vote of confidence in the city with substantial financial investment; as a result, Shenzhen has been integrated into the global presence of an increasing number of multinational corporations.

As our gaze turns to the major platforms within the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, the narrative of openness is given a more profound dimension. Qianhai, Hetao – these iconic symbols of openness are woven together like a string of beads, painting a comprehensive picture of Shenzhen’s institutional opening-up.
In the first half of this year, Qianhai attracted actual foreign direct investment amounting to RMB 25.01 billion, representing a 102.9% increase; the “Hong Kong-funded, Hong Kong-regulated, Hong Kong-arbitrated” framework was officially implemented, enabling professionals from Hong Kong and Macau to practice upon completing the required registration in 27 categories.
The Hetao Shenzhen-Hong Kong Science and Technology Innovation Cooperation Zone hosts more than 200 high-end research projects and nearly 500 technology enterprises, accelerating the formation of the Shenzhen–Hong Kong “Half-Hour Living Circle.”
The soon-to-be-operational Huanggang Port will leverage the “One-Stop Dual-Inspection” model and 28 “Five-in-One” collaborative vehicle inspection lanes to enable a single-stop, single-inspection, and coordinated clearance process – transforming cross-border travel between Shenzhen and Hong Kong from a “two-inspection” procedure to a “single-transaction” process.
Openness has never been about traveling alone; rather, it means moving forward in tandem with the world. Currently, Shenzhen has established sister-city relationships with 95 cities across 59 countries, and its international flight network covers major economies worldwide. Building on the innovative “one hub, two locations” positioning of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, Shenzhen is leveraging institutional openness as a driving force to transform its advantages in openness into competitive edges for development, thereby injecting additional Shenzhen-driven momentum into the shared prosperity of the Asia-Pacific region.
Innovation converges as high-quality productive forces surge forward. In August, at the 2026 World Robot Conference in Yizhuang, Beijing, 28 enterprises from Shenzhen formed a “strongest contingent” to make a collective appearance. Ranging from core components, sensing devices, power systems, and robotic arms to humanoid robots and embodied intelligent large-scale models, these companies have built China’s most comprehensive “robotics industry closed-loop ecosystem,” demonstrating their prowess in living up to the expectation that “Shenzhen is the hub of China’s robotics industry.”
The standout performances on the field stem from years of dedicated expertise in the industrial sector. In Shenzhen, robots are no longer just star attractions at exhibition booths—they have become “new workers” on the production lines. Entering factories and workshops, they collaborate closely with experienced technicians, integrating “Shenzhen Smart Manufacturing” into every single production step.

New energy vehicles serve as a shining emblem of Shenzhen’s high-quality development of new-type productive forces. At the BYD manufacturing facility within the Shenshan Special Cooperation Zone, an entire vehicle leaves the production line every less than one minute on average. Driven by Guangdong’s “High-Quality Development Project for Hundreds of Counties, Thousands of Towns, and Tens of Thousands of Villages,” leading automotive enterprises have attracted upstream and downstream businesses to establish operations in Shenshan. In the first half of the year, over 160,000 vehicles were produced, representing a year-on-year increase of more than 130%, accelerating the formation of a industrial cluster valued at over 100 billion yuan.
The accelerated global expansion of new energy vehicles serves as a vivid illustration of Shenzhen’s “New Three Industries” competing in the worldwide market. In recent years, these “New Three Industries” —represented by new energy vehicles, lithium-ion batteries, and photovoltaic products—have been rapidly launched from Shenzhen and are making their way into global markets, becoming a new hallmark on the streets of numerous countries.
The low-altitude airspace economy is also experiencing rapid growth. In June this year, Shenzhen officially announced the full-scale, routine opening of all low-altitude airspace below 120 meters across the city, with the suitable flight airspace covering 75% of the municipal area; central urban districts—including Futian, Nanshan, and Luohu—have been fully integrated into conventional flight management systems. To date, the city has established 1,284 standardized takeoff and landing points, and has built an integrated air-space-ground supervision and management system leveraging nearly 10,000 5G-A sensing and communication base stations. With an average of over 2,700 low-altitude flight operations per day, the low-altitude airspace economy is rapidly gaining momentum and consolidating its position over Shenzhen, as the prototype of a future-oriented “Sky City” begins to take shape.
Artificial intelligence represents another rapidly growing sector for Shenzhen. As the National Pilot Zone for the Innovative Development of Next-Generation Artificial Intelligence and the National Pilot Zone for the Innovative Application of Artificial Intelligence, Shenzhen is striving to become a pioneering city for AI applications across all domains and scenarios.
Currently, Shenzhen’s core artificial intelligence industry boasts an annual output value exceeding RMB 220 billion, with more than 2,600 large-scale enterprises operating in the sector; the city has also released five batches totaling nearly 300 “City + AI” application scenario lists. The city’s overall industrial competitiveness firmly places it among the top-tier players nationwide. Leading enterprises serve as the backbone of the industry, AI unicorns and publicly listed robotics companies are gaining rapid momentum, while small and micro enterprises form a dynamic new force – collectively shaping an AI industry ecosystem in Shenzhen where “large enterprises stand tall and influential, while small businesses thrive everywhere.”
Innovation is not merely about products—it extends to entire ecosystems. Currently, Shenzhen is home to approximately 4.6 million business entities, including 26,000 National High-Tech Enterprises—equivalent to about 13 enterprises per square kilometer on average—while the share of added value from strategic emerging industries in the city’s GDP has risen to over 43%. The city’s total R&D investment as a percentage of GDP stands at around 6.5%. For 22 consecutive years, Shenzhen has ranked first among all Chinese cities in the number of PCT international patent applications. The city has cultivated a “tropical rainforest-style” innovation ecosystem, comprising scientific research institutions with cutting-edge exploration and technology commercialization capabilities, large enterprises brimming with innovative vitality, and small and medium-sized enterprises endowed with the resilience to experiment and iterate.
From robotics to new energy vehicles, from the low-altitude economy to artificial intelligence – Shenzhen is driving the deep integration of scientific and technological innovation with industrial innovation, accelerating the cultivation of new types of productive forces, and continuously forging new drivers and competitive advantages for high-quality development.
Improving people’s livelihoods and making the vision of happiness tangible and accessible – school places, hospital beds, parking spaces, public parks and green spaces… These seemingly “small” matters affecting everyday life have been treated as “major priorities” in Shenzhen’s urban governance efforts. Since the launch of the “Million School Places Initiative” in 2020, Shenzhen has added more than 900,000 new primary and secondary school places; over 1,000 community health service centers have been established, creating a “15-minute community health service network”; and over 700,000 units of affordable housing have been built or allocated over the past six years. Last year, spending on nine major categories of public welfare expenditures accounted for nearly 68% of the city’s total fiscal expenditure.
The warmth of a city is also reflected in the precision of its governance. The “@Shenzhen – Public Opinion Rapid Response” platform has significantly streamlined and consolidated its original 537 service channels into a unified system for centralized management and processing, offering 24/7 online support. Currently, the platform boasts over 22 million registered users and handles approximately 42,000 public requests per day.
The green background is equally vibrant. On July 27, the 2026 APEC Ministerial Meeting on Forestry was held in Shenzhen, where participating delegates jointly planted mangrove seedlings. Outside the venue, Shenzhen continues to share its green development experiences: the city now boasts 1,350 public parks, with an average of 14.8 square meters of green space per capita, and 90.1% of its rivers and streams meet high water quality standards; the city has also fostered and expanded green, low-carbon industrial clusters—including those focused on clean energy, digital energy, and new energy vehicles—and achieved 100% electrification of its public bus fleet. Eduardo Pedroza, Executive Director of the APEC Secretariat, remarked, “Shenzhen has balanced rapid economic development with ecological conservation, offering a valuable reference for regional urban governance.” Forty-six years have passed in the blink of an eye. From the historic blasting of the Kaishan Mine in Shekou to the upcoming commencement of the APEC meeting, Shenzhen has expanded its horizons through reform, pooled its resources through openness, and secured its future through innovation. In fewer than 100 days, guests from across the Asia-Pacific region will gather in this city, known as the “Pengcheng.” What this city will showcase is not merely data, products, or application scenarios, but a viable pathway for developing economies as they advance toward modernization.
The Pacific monsoon sweeps across the region year after year; the tides of Shenzhen Bay rise and fall endlessly. These remarkable historical milestones have repeatedly converged along the coast of the South China Sea; and the monumental responsibilities of our era have time and again been entrusted to the shoulders of Shenzhen.
At this new starting point, the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone is breathing openness into the wind, carving innovation into the waves, sowing happiness across every inch of its land, and inscribing a bright future for Chinese modernization into its record of pioneering demonstration.