- China is accelerating the construction of a “national computing network” to transform AI infrastructure into a public utility, similar to electricity, water, and national telecommunications.
- State media describes the system as a “computing version of the national power grid,” where AI tokens are viewed similarly to mobile data in the 4G and 5G eras.
- According to data from China’s National Bureau of Statistics, the number of AI tokens processed daily in the country exceeded 140 trillion in March 2026.
- Token usage is now more than 1,000 times higher than at the beginning of 2024, reflecting an explosion in AI demand nationwide.
- Beijing believes the cost of running AI models is becoming a burden for businesses and developers, much like the early days of mobile internet when data was expensive.
- The Chinese government wants to standardize and expand computing infrastructure in the same way it previously deployed large-scale 4G and 5G networks.
- Instead of letting cloud providers and data centers control computing power, Beijing is positioning compute as strategic national-level infrastructure.
- The AI computing system is included in the “six networks” — six key infrastructures including electricity, water, logistics, telecommunications, and underground urban networks.
- China’s State Council recently requested enhanced planning and construction of these infrastructure networks to support the AI economy.
- The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) predicts that total investment in the “six networks” and related sectors could exceed 7 trillion yuan, or more than $1 trillion, in 2026.
📌 China views AI compute as strategic national infrastructure rather than the private resource of Big Tech. With AI token volume increasing more than 1,000 times in just about two years, Beijing aims to build a “super computing network” similar to a power grid or national telecom network to reduce AI costs and broaden access. This approach shows that China considers AI tokens as the “new mobile data” of the digital economy. If successful, the country could create the world’s first national-scale AI utility model while strengthening its advantage in the global AI infrastructure race.
