The shipbuilding industry serves as an important industrial foundation for safeguarding national security and upholding maritime rights and interests. With a solid informatized foundation, an urgent need for transformation, and a manageable level of difficulty to implement, it is a key sector for advancing the fused application of the Industrial Internet.

Reference Guide on the Fused Application of the Industrial Internet in the Shipbuilding Industry, Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, June 5, 2025

China’s shipbuilding industry has entered a new phase of digitalized industrial transformation. A newly released 116-page document from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT), titled the Reference Guide on the Fused Application of the Industrial Internet in the Shipbuilding Industry, lays out a roadmap for applying the Industrial Internet across the entire shipbuilding lifecycle, from research and design to production, delivery, maintenance, and supply chain coordination.

The digital transformation of advanced manufacturing, including heavy industry, has been a core element of Digital China since its elevation to a national strategy in 2017. In this newest phase, MIIT is targeting both the shipbuilding and petrochemical industries for comprehensive Industrial Internet integration. That pairing suggests that the shipbuilding initiative is not an isolated pilot, but part of a broader sector-by-sector effort to digitally integrate strategic industrial systems.

The shipbuilding case is especially significant because it brings that broader industrial program into a sector with direct military-civil implications. The guide does not present the shipbuilding initiative as a formal Military-Civil Fusion program, and the term “fused” in its title refers to the fused application of the Industrial Internet. But shipbuilding is a dual-use industry deeply embedded in China’s defense industrial system, connecting commercial shipyards, state-owned industrial groups, research institutes, supply chains, maritime industries, and defense industries. Applying the Industrial Internet across this full system therefore has visible military-civil implications, even where the formal title is absent.

This may also point toward a broader evolution in Military-Civil Fusion (MCF) itself. Earlier approaches to MCF often emphasized lists of firms, factories, research institutes, dual-use technologies, or procurement relationships. The shipbuilding guide suggests a more systemic model: using digital platforms, data systems, Industrial Internet infrastructure, and sector-wide coordination mechanisms to integrate entire strategic industrial chains.

This is what makes the guide strategically important. It is not simply a plan to make shipbuilding more digital. It is part of a wider effort to strengthen strategic industrial bases through data, platforms, networks, and intelligent coordination. The result is a useful case study in how Digital China is moving from infrastructure construction and enterprise digitalization toward full industrial-system integration.

A lightly-edited selection of Google Translate excerpts from the “Reference Guide on the Fused Application of the Industrial Internet in the Shipbuilding Industry” can be found here.

A New Phase of Digital China: From Industrial Upgrade to System Integration

The Central Committee and the State Council attach great importance to the development of the Industrial Internet. In recent years, through the concerted efforts of all stakeholders, spanning government, industry, academia, research institutions, and end-users, our country’s Industrial Internet development has gradually established its own conceptual framework, implementation pathways, and tangible achievements.

Reference Guide on the Fused Application of the Industrial Internet in the Shipbuilding Industry, Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, June 5, 2025

China’s shipbuilding sector now appears to be one of the clearest public examples of a dual-use, defense-relevant industry undergoing system-wide Industrial Internet transformation. The MIIT reference guide positions shipbuilding not merely as a legacy industry in need of modernization, but as a strategic testbed for the next stage of Digital China.

The significance lies in scope. Rather than digitalizing individual firms, workshops, or isolated production processes, the guide seeks to connect the shipbuilding industrial chain into a continuous, data-driven system. Suppliers, shipyards, research institutes, design units, platform providers, and downstream users are to be linked through networks, platforms, identifiers, data systems, and intelligent decision-making tools.

The guide’s stated objective is to establish a modernized shipbuilding system (现代化船舶制造体系). That system is expected to leverage massive data collection, high-quality analytics, intelligent decision-making, and supply chain resilience to support an industrial ecosystem that is efficient, safe, and green.

This transformation is driven by the fused application of “new generation information technologies like big data, cloud computing, and artificial intelligence” throughout the supply chain. In this context, “digital-intelligent” transformation means more than adding software to production lines. It means using data, platforms, networks, and AI-enabled decision systems to reorganize how the entire industrial chain operates.

Why the Industrial Internet Matters

The Industrial Internet is the infrastructure that supports the digitalized, networkized, and intelligentized development of the shipbuilding industry.

Reference Guide on the Fused Application of the Industrial Internet in the Shipbuilding Industry (工业互联网与船舶行业融合应用参考指南), Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, June 5, 2025

The Industrial Internet is one of the key mechanisms through which Digital China enters the real economy. It connects people, machines, equipment, data, platforms, production processes, and supply chains into digitally integrated industrial systems.

The Industrial Internet1 is classified as a Tier Three application model under New Type Infrastructure, as defined by the National Development and Reform Commission in April 2020. It has also been a central element of Digital China since the strategy’s elevation in 2017, became part of the New Type Infrastructure agenda in 2020, and was elevated further after the Fifth Plenum of the 19th Party Congress in October 2020, followed by MIIT’s release of Industrial Internet Innovative Development Action Plan for 2021-2023 in December 2020.

The China Academy of the Industrial Internet describes the Industrial Internet as an industrial ecosystem that “deeply integrates a new generation of information and communication technology with the industrial economy. By comprehensively connecting people, machines, things, and systems, it creates a new manufacturing and services system spanning the full manufacturing and value chain. From industry to manufacturing, the Industrial Internet enables digitalized, networkized, and intelligentized development.” The Academy also identifies the Industrial Internet as “an important cornerstone of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.”

For shipbuilding, this is key because the industry is complex, capital-intensive, supply-chain dependent, and strategically sensitive. Modern shipbuilding requires coordination across design, materials, propulsion systems, electrical equipment, shipyards, classification bodies, defense users, commercial operators, and maintenance providers. The Industrial Internet provides the connective architecture for turning that fragmented ecosystem into a more integrated industrial system.

The “155N” Strategy for Digital-Intelligent Shipbuilding

Addressing the digital transformation requirements of the shipbuilding industry and aiming to leverage digital empowerment to enhance quality, reduce costs, and boost efficiency, we are advancing the fused development of the Industrial Internet and the shipbuilding industry, grounded in lean principles and centered on the core themes of digitalized, networkized, and intelligentized shipbuilding.

Reference Guide on the Fused Application of the Industrial Internet in the Shipbuilding Industry (工业互联网与船舶行业融合应用参考指南), Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, June 5, 2025

The reference guide organizes its implementation strategy around a “155N” framework for the fused application of the Industrial Internet and the shipbuilding industry. The goal is to comprehensively improve digitalization across shipbuilding design, production, management, and supply chain coordination; promote High Quality Development; and build a modernized shipbuilding system with world-leading digital capabilities.

In practice, “155N” translates the guide’s strategic ambition into four implementation layers: one overarching goal, five Industrial Internet foundations, five safeguard systems, and an open-ended set of application scenarios.

One Goal is to promote an efficient, safe, and green modernized shipbuilding system. This includes large-scale data collection, aggregation, analysis, and mining; the use of data as a key factor of production; and the development of intelligent capabilities for analysis, optimization, and decision support across the shipbuilding system.

Five Foundations refers to the basic Industrial Internet capabilities required for shipbuilding digitalization: data, networks, identifiers, platforms, and safety. These foundations provide the technical and organizational base for integrated digital services across the industrial chain.

Five Safeguards refers to the organizational, institutional, financial, talent, and cultural support systems required to advance the digital transformation of the industry in an orderly and sustainable way.

N Application Scenarios refers to an open-ended set of intelligent fused application scenarios across ship research and development, production, management, quality control, safety, supply chain coordination, green development, and maintenance services.

The structure of the “155N” strategy is important because it shows that MIIT is not treating shipbuilding digitalization as a single technology deployment. It is presenting the transformation as a whole-of-industry operating model.

Still Early, but Moving Fast

In recent years, in response to domestic and international developments and the need for its own transformation and upgrading, China’s shipbuilding industry has, building on the continuous improvement of its core infrastructure, actively explored the application of digital technologies such as artificial intelligence, big data, virtual simulation, the Industrial Internet, 5G, and digital twins, and has achieved some success.

Reference Guide on the Fused Application of the Industrial Internet in the Shipbuilding Industry, Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, June 5, 2025

The reference guide is careful to note that the fused application of the Industrial Internet in the shipbuilding industry remains in a developmental stage. Implementation is still exploratory and phased. Future editions of the guide are expected to incorporate practical experience and feedback from across the industry.

That caveat is significant. The guide should not be read as evidence that China has already completed the digital transformation of shipbuilding. It is better understood as evidence that Beijing is now systematizing the next phase.

The guide identifies several areas requiring deeper modernization: shipbuilding R&D and design, production efficiency, quality monitoring and traceability, worker safety, energy efficiency, green development, supply chain efficiency, and supply chain resilience. These are not marginal improvements. They are the core functions of a modern shipbuilding industrial system.

The direction is clear even if implementation remains incomplete. China is moving from experimental digital applications toward integrated industrial architecture.

Military-Civil Fusion in Shipbuilding

From the perspective of the industrial chain, the upstream of the shipbuilding industry consists of various raw materials and supporting equipment, primarily including steel, non-ferrous metals, composite materials, propulsion systems, and electrical equipment. The midstream encompasses the actual manufacturing of vessels, while the downstream comprises application sectors, such as shipping, national defense industries, and marine resource development, as well as vessel-related service segments, including leasing and maintenance.

Reference Guide on the Fused Application of the Industrial Internet in the Shipbuilding Industry, Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, June 5, 2025

The Industrial Internet guide provides an important window into the Military-Civil Fusion dimension of Digital China.

Military-Civil Fusion was frequently emphasized in Chinese state media and official documents before 2016, but the phrase has become less prominent in public-facing discourse in recent years. The logic, however, has not disappeared. In shipbuilding, it remains embedded in the structure of the industrial chain itself.

The reference guide does not explicitly describe the initiative as Military-Civil Fusion, and the term “fused” in the guide’s title refers to the fused application of the Industrial Internet rather than to Military-Civil Fusion as a formal title. But the practical implications are visible. The same digital-industrial architecture is being applied across a dual-use industry deeply embedded in China’s defense-industrial system.

This may indicate a broader evolution in how Military-Civil Fusion is being implemented. Earlier forms of MCF were often visible through lists of firms, factories, research institutes, technologies, or procurement relationships. In the shipbuilding guide, however, the relevant unit is larger. The object of transformation is the industrial chain itself. The Industrial Internet is being used to connect design, production, supply chains, data systems, platforms, quality control, safety, maintenance, and downstream users across a sector that includes both civilian and defense functions.

State Administration for Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense (SASTIND) participation since 2018 in the Industrial Internet Special Working Group, including a 2018 task assigned to SASTIND’s System Engineering Third Department, a department linked through predecessor structures to shipbuilding, strengthens this interpretation.2 It suggests that defense industry authorities are not merely observing industrial digitalization from the outside, but are connected to the institutional process through which sector-wide digital transformation is being organized.

Shipbuilding is inherently dual-use. The upstream supply chain includes steel, non-ferrous metals, composite materials, propulsion systems, electrical equipment, and other critical inputs. The midstream includes vessel manufacturing. The downstream includes commercial shipping, marine resource development, vessel services, and defense industries.

The guide’s focus on digitalized R&D and design, supply chain management, product quality monitoring, intelligent unmanned assembly, and multi-site collaborative manufacturing therefore has civilian and defense significance at the same time. It strengthens the industrial base as a whole, while improving the data flows, coordination mechanisms, and production capabilities that support both commercial and defense shipbuilding.

In this sense, the guide does not need to use the phrase Military-Civil Fusion for the military-civil implications to be visible. The fusion is functional, embedded in the industrial architecture, and expressed through the digital transformation of the entire shipbuilding industry.

Participants: A Full Dual-Use Industrial Ecosystem

The Alliance of the Industrial Internet, under the guidance of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology Information and Communication Management Bureau and the Manufacturing Industry No. 2 Department, has collaborated with various industry stakeholders to research and compile the Reference Guide for the Fused Application of the Industrial Internet in the Shipbuilding Industry. This Guide aims to provide a reference for requirement scenario identification, application model creation, critical system construction, and organizational implementation methodologies as the Industrial Internet is being fused with the shipbuilding industry.

Reference Guide on the Fused Application of the Industrial Internet in the Shipbuilding Industry, Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, June 5, 2025

The participant list reinforces the strategic nature of the initiative. This is not a single-company modernization effort or a narrow technical pilot. It is a coordinated industrial ecosystem involving regulators, research bodies, industry associations, state-owned shipbuilding champions, shipyards, research institutes, and industrial technology providers.

The lead organizations participating in the shipbuilding digitalization program, and contributing to the reference guide, include MIIT elements as well as a broad cross-section of civilian and defense-relevant entities within the shipbuilding industry:

  • MIIT Information and Communication Management Bureau
  • MIIT Manufacturing Industry No. 2 Department
  • Industrial Internet Industry Alliance
  • MIIT China Academy of Information and Communications Technology
  • China Association of the National Shipbuilding Industry
  • Chinese Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers
  • China Classification Society
  • China State Shipbuilding Corporation
  • Jiangnan Shipyard
  • CSSC Huangpu Wenchong Shipbuilding Company
  • COSCO Shipping Heavy Industry Company
  • Wuhu Shipyard
  • CSSC 716 Research Institute
  • CSSC 11 Research Institute
  • CSSC Industrial Internet Company
  • Jiangsu Zhongtian Internet Technology Company
  • Zhendui Industry Artificial Intelligence Company

The inclusion of CSSC, major shipyards, research institutes, classification bodies, Industrial Internet organizations, and industrial AI firms shows the breadth of the system being assembled. The guide is not only describing digital tools. It is helping organize the institutional, technical, and industrial architecture for shipbuilding transformation.

The composition of the participant ecosystem also supports the Military-Civil Fusion reading. The same process brings together civilian industrial actors, state-owned shipbuilding groups, technical standard-setters, research institutes, platform providers, and defense-relevant entities. This is not fusion as a single transaction between a civilian firm and a military customer. It is fusion through shared industrial architecture.

Conclusion: From Factory Lists to Industrial Chains

The MIIT shipbuilding guide shows Digital China entering a more mature stage. The focus is no longer simply on building digital infrastructure or encouraging individual enterprises to adopt digital tools. The deeper objective is system integration: linking strategic industries into data-driven, platform-enabled, intelligent industrial ecosystems.

Shipbuilding is an especially important test case. It is a pillar of maritime power, a major advanced manufacturing sector, a foundation for supply chain resilience, and a deeply embedded dual-use industry within China’s defense-industrial system. By applying the Industrial Internet across the full shipbuilding lifecycle, China is seeking to improve efficiency, quality, safety, green development, supply chain coordination, and industrial competitiveness at the same time.

The Military-Civil Fusion implications are embedded in the structure of the effort. Even where the formal slogan is absent, the logic remains visible. A digitalized shipbuilding industry that includes commercial operators, state-owned shipbuilding groups, research institutes, shipyards, technology providers, and defense industries is not merely an industrial modernization project. It is a strategic industrial system.

This may be the larger signal. The future of Military-Civil Fusion may not look like a simple list of factories, enterprises, or dual-use technologies. It may look like the digital integration of entire industrial chains. In that model, data, platforms, networks, identifiers, supply chain systems, and intelligent decision-making tools become the connective tissue linking civilian and defense-relevant production.

That is why this guide tells us something important. It shows how Digital China is being translated into the operating architecture of advanced manufacturing. It also shows how the Industrial Internet is becoming one of the core mechanisms through which China seeks to convert data, platforms, networks, and intelligent systems into national industrial power.

Footnotes

  1. While not exhaustive, the following English-language papers, listed chronologically, offer excellent background on the Industrial Internet in China. Notably, Jeff Pao is one of the few writers In English who have accurately linked the Industrial Internet to the Digital China strategy:

    Qiu Ping, “Progress in Developing the Industrial Internet in China,” Qiushi, June 09, 2025

    Nicholas Welch, “Manufacturing’s Missing Revolution: Lessons the techno-industrial competition with China,” ChinaTalk, March 03, 2025

    Liu Yanyan, “What Is the Industrial Internet?” Huawei Info-Finder, July 01, 2024

    Mary Hui, “China bets on industrial AI: Doing so sidesteps its US tech dependence and amplifies its manufacturing might,” a/symmetric, April 26, 2024

    John Lee, “China and the Industrial Internet of Things,” Leiden Asia Centre, June 23, 2023

    Jeff Pao, “Chinese industries to go digital or die ‘Digital China’ plan emphasizes ‘industrial internet’ in a state-led drive for world-class competitiveness and supply chain supremacy,” Asia Times, March 11, 2023

    Matt Sheehan, “Remaking “Made in China”: Beijing’s Industrial Internet Ambitions,” MacroPolo, February 22, 2021 ↩︎
  2. SASTIND is a State Council bureau administered by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology at the deputy ministerial level. Its public mandate places it at the center of China’s defense science, technology, and industry system, making its presence in the Industrial Internet Special Working Group significant for understanding the program’s military-civil implications. According to the SASTIND website, “the State Administration for Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense is the administrative agency of the Chinese government responsible for managing the national defense science, technology, and industry sector. It is charged with organizing and coordinating major matters concerning the research, development, and production of weapons and equipment across fields such as nuclear energy, aerospace, aviation, shipbuilding, ordnance, and electronics, as well as with building core capabilities within the defense industries.” (国家国防科技工业局是中国政府负责管理国防科技工业的行政管理机关，负责核、航天、航空、船舶、兵器、电子等领域武器装备科研生产重大事项的组织协调和军工核心能力建设。) ↩︎