U.S. tech rivalry heats up
PwC Global President Mohamed Kande gives China Council for the Promotion of International Trade (CCPIT) Chairman Ren Hongbin a tour of the company’s booth at a supply chain expo in Beijing on June 24, 2026.
CNBC | Evelyn Cheng
Hello, I’m Evelyn, writing to you from Beijing. Welcome to the latest edition of The China Connection, a snapshot of what I see and hear from local businesses.
As more Chinese tech companies set their sights on global users, competition with the United States is entering a new phase.
big story
From data centers to artificial intelligence applications, Chinese companies are rapidly expanding beyond their home markets, just like American companies race to do the same.
“US technology investors need to follow closely “Due to increasing competition from Chinese technology, as we see, many Chinese companies are prioritizing market share over profit margins,” market strategist Peter Boockvar wrote on June 24.
Bringing to market low-cost AI models with capabilities that rival American-made models was only the first step.
Next is industrial integration. This is a sign that price and functionality will become increasingly important as economic competition expands globally; The events of the past week clearly demonstrate this.
The use of artificial intelligence in manufacturing will create more jobs and opportunities “not only here, but also outside China, where many companies will benefit from Chinese technology,” Mohamed Kande, global head of PwC, told a panel at the state-run China International Supply Chain Expo in Beijing on Wednesday.
Despite China’s decades-long role as a global manufacturing hub, the supply chain expo itself exhibits only released in 2023 After Chinese President Xi Jinping’s call to improve industrial safety.
The same morning, Chinese Premier Li Qiang referred to the fair at the World Economic Forum. “Summer Davos” event in Dalian To highlight how innovation can offset global economic downsides.
It announced that China’s open-source artificial intelligence models have been downloaded 10 billion times worldwide.
“China will integrate more proactively “To global innovation and industrial chains,” he said, according to an official English translation.
Chinese companies use AI for cross-industry collaboration Far more than businesses elsewhere, particularly US firms, PwC said in a report released as the supply chain fair got underway. Kande and PwC declined to comment further.
US playbook
The USA is not standing still.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs signed last week new European participants for him “Pax Silica” initiative secure global technology supply chainsWhile calling on countries to Rally behind US tech rather than developing competing systems.
Following the two-day Pax Silica summit that ended in Washington DC on Friday, the US advanced manufacturing program with Stanford University.
And sharing the stage with PwC’s Kande in Beijing Boeing’s Also Chinese President Landon Loomis US representative to the APEC Business Advisory Council.
Loomis emphasized APEC’s upcoming “digital week” in Chengdu The coming month is seen as an “important opportunity” for member economies to discuss AI governance and “technological operability”.
Although the event will take place in China, US tech companies are expected to attend and hold workshops supporting American AI capabilities, a US official previously told CNBC.
Meanwhile, American companies in China are treading the middle path.
Honeywell’s China used the fair to announce a partnership that integrates its world. ByteDance’s production management system and artificial intelligence capabilities enterprise software Lark. Honeywell China President William Yu claimed in a panel at the fair that, thanks to the system, Honeywell customers can increase their returns by three to five times.
While Nvidia’s Jensen Huang sent a video message after attending in person last year, fair organizers said Apple’s Chief Operating Officer Sabih Khan attended for the first time this year. The iPhone maker did not respond to CNBC’s request for comment.
The next battlefield
The efforts of US companies to gain a foothold in China come as Chinese companies are moving abroad, especially in cloud computing infrastructure.
Earlier this month, Alibaba announced its third European data center in France, joining facilities in the UK and Germany.
S&P Global Ratings analyst Aras Poon said the move “underlines Alibaba’s global cloud ambitions.”
“The French site will likely bring data closer to local customers, reduce latency, increase reliability and position Alibaba to serve more complex, time-sensitive workloads,” Poon said.
Alibaba and ByteDance are also investing predominantly in data centers in AsiaAmazon, Google, Microsoft and Oracle are also pursuing similar structures. By 2030, Asia Pacific could account for roughly 34% of global data center demand, while North America is predicted to account for 46%. McKinsey said in a report last week.
The global AI race is no longer just about who creates the smartest model, it’s also about ecosystems.
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Tencent is testing AI assistant in China’s most popular app to catch up with rivals
Xiaowei, a “native AI assistant,” is being tested “on a small scale” on Weixin, the Chinese version of WeChat, Tencent said in a statement translated by CNBC.
Second worker at BYD factory in Hungary under investigation for labor practices dies
The death follows a death at the facility in February and follows BYD vice president Stella Li denying allegations of workforce abuse at the facility earlier this month. The automaker did not respond to requests for comment on the latest death.
US battles Brazil for China’s huge soybean market
Jim Sutter, CEO of the U.S. Soybean Export Council, told CNBC that China has purchased all of the 12 million metric tons of American soybeans it agreed to purchase in the marketing year ending August 2026, and nearly all of them have been shipped. He said that purchases have started for the next 25 million tons.
approaching
June 30: China’s official manufacturing PMI for June
July 1: 105th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China (CCP)
July 1: China New rules on outbound investments be effective
July 1: RatingDog China June manufacturing PMI
July 3: RatingDog China services PMI for June
July 2-5: Global Digital Economy conference in Beijing
