Study of Innovation and Technology in China

The Study of Innovation and Technology in China (SITC) is a project of the University of California Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation. SITC Research Briefs provide analysis and recommendations based on the work of project participants. Author's views are their own. I f China's defense industrial system is to deliver radically innovative defense products to the People's Liberation Army, a fundamental shift in the logic that underlies its defense technology and acquisition system will be necessary, from one that develops and integrates technology in linear, follow-on fashion to one that takes a systems-based approach. Ongoing defense industrial reforms and advances made in Chinese science, technology, and research capabilities have aided the defense sector's extensive technology acquisition and integration processes, resulting in more rapid development and modestly innovative products in recent years. Yet China's past defense industrial processes have to date followed the more traditional, linear, industrial-age development model, which is likely to limit the type of innovation realized. As China continues its pursuit of civilian-military integration (CMI) and focuses on mastering both the art and the science of innovation as applied to the defense sector in shifting to a system-of-systems development model more conducive to the information age, we are likely to see significant changes in China's approach to—and potentially advances in—defense innovation.