On January 1, U.S. Representative Thomas Massie tweeted a "complaint" that COVID-19 test kits made in China had been widely approved for use, and included a close-up photo of the Chinese certificate of conformity.

At the time, many American netizens fired back at him, asking, “What’s the problem? A lot of the stuff you can buy in the U.S. is made in China.”

▲ The hashtags at the end are quite interesting: #FineThen #USGovernmentUnderBiden

Additionally, according to The Times, the British government invested millions of pounds in 2020 to promote the development of the domestic COVID-19 testing kit industry, but ultimately only one local manufacturer passed the approval process. Currently, the UK still has to rely on two Chinese companies for supplies.

▲ Headline: UK Test Kits Fail to Pass "Red Tape" Tests

As the Omicron variant ravages the U.S., demand for COVID-19 test kits has skyrocketed, and prices have surged rapidly. The price of a standard two-test rapid kit has risen from $14–$24 to $75.

Seeing the stark contrast between China and the US, one can’t help but… hmm.

Test kits may not seem particularly high-tech, but achieving mass production requires the support of a complete industrial chain.

Although the molecular diagnostic technology required to develop these kits is already quite mature, challenges persist across the entire process—from raw material supply to the production of biological enzymes and the manufacturing of kit packaging.

It is worth noting that in 2020, manufacturing accounted for only 8.67% of the UK’s GDP. In a country like the UK, where industrial hollowing-out is severe, can a complete industrial chain really be built with just a few million pounds?

In contrast, China’s relatively complete manufacturing industrial chain, coupled with the Chinese Communist Party’s exceptionally strong and outstanding leadership, has enabled the country to perform outstandingly in pandemic control—a fact that is certainly a source of pride.

However, one point cannot be overlooked: the PCR-fluorescent probe technology widely used in China’s nucleic acid testing is actually not complex. Of course, it is precisely because the method is simple that it is sufficiently efficient.

If epidemiological investigations are to be conducted, sequence variations analyzed, and transmission routes identified, more complex gene sequencing technologies are required.

▲ Gene sequencers: the golden key to the gene sequencing industry

The upstream segment of the gene sequencing industry’s supply chain is currently dominated by Western countries, particularly in the realm of gene sequencers, where U.S.-based Illumina and Thermo Fisher Scientific hold nearly 90% of the global market share.

Therefore, while marveling at the irreplaceable advantages of a complete industrial chain, we must also acknowledge that China still has a long way to go in mastering the core technologies of most cutting-edge fields.

Why are high-end technologies in many industries monopolized by the United States? Why is the U.S. always the first to achieve technological breakthroughs?

This inevitably leads us to the U.S. bottom-up system.

Collective rights in the United States stem from the agreements of every individual. From the Mayflower Compact—the first political contract in American history—to the later Declaration of Independence, the spirit of contract permeates every aspect of American society, shaping the country’s bottom-up operational model.

Interestingly, innovation also requires a bottom-up approach.

For example, many cutting-edge fields are currently eager for technological breakthroughs, but no one can accurately predict in which field the next breakthrough will occur, making it difficult to “pool resources to tackle major projects.”

What is the solution? The American approach is: ants foraging.

Just as ants go out in search of food, their initial movements are actually completely random and haphazard. Whoever finds something returns to notify the colony, and then everyone works together to carry the food back.

▲ From the foraging behavior of ants, people have also developed a probabilistic algorithm for finding optimal paths—the ant colony optimization algorithm—but that’s a story for another time.

After all, looking back, many of humanity’s technological breakthroughs weren’t planned. The steam engine was invented by Watt to improve coal mine water wheels, and Stephenson—who built the first train—didn’t start school until he was 18. The founder of IBM initially believed the world needed only five computers, yet after countless companies have competed over the years, computers have become smaller and cheaper, with nearly everyone owning one today. None of this was planned.

So the American approach is to let every organization and individual in the market figure out how to proceed. They pitch their ideas to raise funds; once funded, they keep working on them; and if they produce results, investors will naturally keep pouring in. Through this iterative process, truly capable companies will gradually grow stronger and larger.

Countless companies and organizations are gradually weeded out in this race, leaving only one or two winners. They might be Google, Microsoft, or Tesla—or perhaps a new force yet to emerge.

This bottom-up model may seem chaotic and disorderly, but it is highly adaptable—much like the Earth itself. When an asteroid struck and wiped out the dinosaurs, it didn’t matter; mammals rose to prominence.

The current global economic landscape is equally fraught with uncertainty; no one knows what changes tomorrow may bring. The best approach is to maintain a sufficiently large pool of options, so that we have contingency plans ready for whatever may happen.

There are some voices online suggesting that the U.S. is on the verge of collapse and that China could overtake it with a little effort, but this is actually very unrealistic.

It is true that China has already “gotten a stranglehold” on the U.S. in certain sectors, such as the solar industry, but in most areas, we still have no choice but to learn from the U.S.—and there is no shame in that.

Since the U.S. is neither out of reach nor can we catch up in one fell swoop, let’s wage a protracted war: learn the good and discard the bad. We haven’t even finished learning yet—why should we decouple?

Regarding the technological gap, Huawei Senior Vice President Chen Lifang once remarked, “After decades of catching up, the distance between us and the U.S. is no longer a million miles, but there are still 25,000 miles to go. We must remain committed to learning and not let anti-American sentiment dominate our work.”

▲ On September 3, 2021, the Beijing Stock Exchange was established with capital from the National Equities Exchange and Quotations Co., Ltd. (NEEQ).

In 2021, China frequently introduced support policies targeting “specialized, refined, distinctive, and innovative” SMEs, in an effort to establish a bottom-up innovation model. The establishment of the Beijing Stock Exchange is also a key measure aimed at improving the capital market and addressing the financing challenges faced by SMEs.

China is a major manufacturing nation, but it is not yet a manufacturing powerhouse. There remains a significant gap between China and advanced nations in areas such as industrial software, aircraft engines, and semiconductors, and specialized manufacturing sectors like sensors and precision laboratory equipment are still dominated by foreign companies. These challenges cannot be resolved solely through large enterprises or economies of scale; rather, they must be addressed by “specialized, refined, distinctive, and innovative” enterprises that emerge from the vast and diverse pool of small and medium-sized enterprises.

Ultimately, the key lies in effectively protecting intellectual property rights, allowing the market to nurture competitive SMEs, and then enabling these SMEs to gradually grow into large enterprises, thereby fostering innovation from the bottom up.

As a service provider for regional economic development, Guichuan Lianhang is rooted at the forefront of industrial development. Through close collaboration with local governments, we constantly sense the true pulse of China’s economic growth.

In China, local governments play a vital role in economic development. How effectively we combine the government’s guiding role with the spontaneous creativity of the people—forming a synergy between top-down and bottom-up forces—will determine the heights China can reach in the future.

In this new stage of development, we will align our investment promotion efforts with national policy requirements. On one hand, we will assist local governments in attracting leading enterprises, tackling tough challenges and overcoming obstacles; on the other hand, we will place greater emphasis on attracting and nurturing small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), enabling them to serve as a vital complement to the nation’s major industrial pillars.

Perhaps this is the historical mission entrusted to us by our times.