On 4 September 2026, China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) issued the 'AI SME Entrepreneurship Support Plan (2026-2028),' structured as 4 areas and 15 key tasks. Over three years it aims to cultivate 10,000+ new tech and innovation-focused SMEs and 2,000+ 'specialized and sophisticated little giant' firms in AI, plus 10 tech incubators, 10 national SME public-service platforms, and 10 national AI-focused SME industrial clusters, with measures to pool computing resources and open high-quality industry datasets.
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China's MIIT launches AI SME plan, targets 10,000+ new AI startups by 2028
Why this matters for founders
AI founders in mainland China should track their provincial and municipal MIIT portals for the incubator, computing-power subsidy, and 'little giant' recognition tracks this plan will fund, since qualifying early can unlock shared compute, datasets, and priority financing.
Source: Xinhua (news.cn)
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