(Xinhua/Liu Lingyi)
The Davos Summer Forum 2026 concluded on Thursday in the northeastern Chinese city of Dalian, highlighting the greater importance of innovation in an era of accelerating technological transformation and growing uncertainty, as well as the central role of China.
The event, also known as the 17th Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF) New Champions, was held under the theme “Innovating at Scale”. Organized from June 23 to 25, it brought together more than 1,700 participants from more than 90 countries and regions to discuss ways to transform innovation into better jobs, stronger economies and new growth opportunities.
In the conference rooms and throughout the sessions, discussions covered topics ranging from artificial intelligence and humanoid robotics to quantum technologies, biomedicine, advanced manufacturing and green industries. Many of these sectors are also areas in which China has established itself as an increasingly important innovator and key partner in international cooperation.
Innovation-driven development is the key to China’s long-term economic resilience and stable growth, Chinese Premier Li Qiang said in his address at the forum’s opening plenary session on Wednesday.
“For global development, ‘China Opportunity 2.0’ means wider access to advanced technologies and wider sharing of development benefits,” he said, stressing that innovation-oriented cooperation is an essential choice to overcome the global growth dilemma.
“As the geopolitical landscape becomes more fragmented, innovations remain deeply interconnected,” said Mirek Dusek, Director General of the WEF, during the closing ceremony. “What the world needs today are investment architectures, policy frameworks and international cooperation to deploy them at high speed and scale.”
He also announced that the next Davos Summer Forum would be held in 2027 in the northern Chinese port city of Tianjin.
Created by the WEF in 2007, the Davos Summer Forum is organized each year alternately in the Chinese port cities of Tianjin and Dalian.
