An exemplar of infrastructure for its progress in engineering railways, roads and airports, China has turned its attention to a new field of developmental expertise.

New infrastructure was first proposed at the Central Economic Work Conference in 2018. The concept has gained further traction in 2020.

A meeting of senior Communist Party of China leaders on March 4 emphasized that the country is to accelerate the construction of new infrastructure such as 5G networks and data centers. New infrastructure was divided into seven categories, namely 5G networks, extra-high voltage power grids, inter-city rail transit, new-energy vehicle charging stations, big data centers, artificial intelligence (AI) and the industrial Internet.

Since its commercial deployment in 2019, 5G has been the centerpiece of China’s new