Today's freshly released Forbes China Best CEO list, at a glance, the number of people from the internet industry is 0

This list is worth savoring. The narrative of China's business elite has shifted from internet platform economy to "hard tech + advanced manufacturing + global supply chain"

1/ Advanced manufacturing dominates the list
If electronics, semiconductors, communications, electrical equipment, hardware, and electronic manufacturing services are all considered "broad hard tech/advanced manufacturing," the proportion exceeds 70%

This is very different from the business narrative in China during 2010-2020. In the previous decade, it was more common to see e-commerce, social, local life, gaming, internet finance, and platform companies on the list. But in this list, platform companies like Alibaba, Tencent, Meituan, JD.com, Pinduoduo, and ByteDance are almost entirely absent

2/ The AI industry chain is the hidden main thread
Although the list does not directly mention AI, many companies actually benefit from AI hardware capital expenditure.

AI is not only beneficial for model companies, but also for AI chips, upstream hardware, communications, semiconductor equipment, storage, materials, PCB, and electronic manufacturing services

3/ Complex manufacturing is China's strength
China is not continuing to replicate the previous round of internet dividends on lightweight asset platforms, but is forming advantages in "heavy assets + engineering + supply chain + going global"

4/ The A-share market is the main battleground
The capital market pricing of China's "hard tech CEOs" mainly takes place in the A-share market; the Hong Kong stock market more heavily hosts consumption, automotive, pharmaceutical, resources, and traditional manufacturing leaders

5/ The main group is CEOs aged 50-60
The main body of the list is not young entrepreneurs, but middle-aged entrepreneurs and engineering managers who have deeply cultivated the industrial chain for a long time.

This also aligns with the laws of manufacturing: truly achieving scale, yield rate, customers, cash flow, and global competitiveness usually requires more than a decade or even two decades of accumulation

6/ Semiconductors are not a single industry, but multiple sub-industries all appearing on the list together
Semiconductor-related companies are very dense, but they are not the same type of company

AI chips: domestic AI computing power narrative
Storage / chip design: domestic substitution + AI server chain
Semiconductor equipment: domestic equipment substitution
Semiconductor materials: upstream materials
Optical modules / communication chip chain: AI data center demand

Rather than saying it's the Best CEO list in China, it's more like: the power map of China's advanced manufacturing industry chain