Welcome back to China Insights Weekly. The year 2025 has come to a close – and what a year it was! From breakthroughs in AI and trade tensions to pop culture moments and record-breaking milestones, the past twelve months offered a series of moments that shaped the debate in and around China.
12 highlights of the year
January – launch of AI DeepSeek
Chinese start-up DeepSeek has introduced an open-source AI model that rivals the latest OpenAI models in mathematics, programming and reasoning tasks, at a cost 95% lower than %. This move shocked the tech world and wiped out $1 trillion in value from American tech companies, including $600 billion from NVIDIA – the largest single-day loss in history.
February – Record-breaking premiere of Ne Zha 2 with box office takings of USD 2.2 billion
The film Ne Zha 2, released during the Lunar New Year, debuted with record-breaking success. It grossed $2.2 billion worldwide, becoming the highest-grossing animated film of all time and the first non-English film to surpass the $2 billion mark. The phenomenon sparked enthusiasm among Chinese audiences and drew global attention to China's burgeoning animation industry.
March – F1 returns to China with 220,000 spectators in attendance
Formula 1 returned to China after a four-year hiatus. The Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai attracted a record 220,000 spectators over the weekend, demonstrating renewed consumer confidence and clearly signalling that major events are truly back after the pandemic.
April – a call for self-sufficiency in AI
President Xi Jinping called on China to accelerate „self-reliance and capacity building“ in AI, catch up with the US, and direct more state support to the sector. The call coincided with Huawei's plan to begin mass shipments of its 910C AI chip, a domestic alternative to Nvidia's H100.
May – a boom in travel and tourism worth one trillion US dollars
During the May Day holidays, Chinese tourism rebounded sharply, with revenues and travel volumes exceeding pre-pandemic levels. Analysts predicted that 2025 would be a record year with USD 1 trillion in domestic and foreign travel, driven by pent-up demand and a visa-free policy that has been extended to citizens of 130 countries, including transit.
June – solar boom: 212 GW added in six months
By June, China had added 212 GW of new solar capacity in the first half of 2025, more than double the previous year. Analysts said the increase would keep China on track to exceed its renewable energy targets by 2030.
July – Luckin Coffee opens two stores in New York
After dominating the domestic market, Chinese chain Luckin Coffee quietly opened shops in New York. Its ultra-cheap lattes for $1.40 and viral marketing stunts signalled a bold challenge to Starbucks on its home turf.
August – Volkswagen's partnership with Xpeng in the field of electric vehicles
In a sign of changing global dynamics in the automotive industry, Volkswagen has deepened its alliance with Chinese electric vehicle manufacturer Xpeng. The two companies have expanded their cooperation to include research and development, joint development of new models, and investment in the company. The move has sparked debate about the indispensability of Chinese EV technology for Western brands.
September – BYD hypercar sets world speed record: 496 km/h
Chinese car manufacturer BYD impressed fans when it broke the world speed record for production cars: its U9 Xtreme hypercar reached a speed of 496 km/h (308 mph). The achievement made headlines around the world and sparked debates about the hierarchy of supercars.
October – publication of the draft 15th Five-Year Plan
At the party's 4th plenary session, leaders approved the framework for the 15th five-year plan, which emphasises quality growth and technological self-sufficiency, with ambitions to build on successes in electromobility and solar energy and extend them to chips, biotechnology and quantum technologies.
November – Chinese AI model surpasses ChatGPT-5
Moonshot AI's Kimi K2 outperformed OpenAI GPT-5 in several benchmarks at a fraction of the cost. It excelled in programming, testing, and working with tools; its open-source availability and exceptionally low training budget attracted worldwide attention.
December – record trade surplus of USD 1.2 trillion
At the end of the year, China's export machine reached new heights: the annual trade surplus was heading towards USD 1.2 trillion, the highest in history. Despite weaker domestic demand, exports remained strong and the surplus nearly doubled compared to four years earlier.
Five themes that shaped 2025
Artificial intelligence: a year of open-source upheaval
The year began with a bang when Beijing-based start-up DeepSeek released its open-source R1 model, which offered GPT-level performance at roughly 95% lower training costs. This shook global technology markets and wiped USD 1 trillion off the value of US stock exchanges. Within weeks, Alibaba's newly released Qwen 2.5-Max rose to the top of the benchmarks. More updates from DeepSeek and Alibaba followed in the spring, and release of Manus, a fully autonomous agent. In the middle of the year Baidu and Huawei have launched their flagship models as open-source and promised to reduce deployment costs by 60–80 %. Together with President Xi Jinping's call for self-sufficiency in AI, this signalled state support for this open-source shift. In July, Moonshot's Kimi K2 arrived, an open-source model with stronger programming and agent integration that outperformed ChatGPT in some benchmarks. Millions of users have embraced open-source models, cementing China's position at the forefront of global AI and setting the stage for 2026.
Green industrial power: batteries, solar, hydrogen and electric vehicles
China's green push in 2025 went far beyond cars. By April, regulators had approved ten new nuclear reactors worth about $27 billion and installed 212 GW of new solar power. In the spring, batteries became the most profitable clean energy export, with revenues of $60 billion, surpassing sales of electric cars. At the same time, companies accelerated their global expansion: foreign investment in clean energy nearly doubled, reaching $80 billion in 2025. By October, they accounted for NEV 52 % new car sales in China and approximately 60 % global sales of battery electric vehicles. Towards the end of the year, scientists took a significant step towards fourth-generation nuclear energy when they built first thorium-powered reactor, which offers greater safety and reduces mechanical stress.
From Labubu to bubble tea: how Chinese brands took the world by storm
The year 2025 proved that Chinese cultural exports can rival technological and industrial achievements. In January, a short-term ban on TikTok in the US sent more than 3 million Americans on the Chinese platform RedNote, where newcomers and veterans exchanged recipes and work tips, resulting in an unprecedented cultural exchange. A few weeks later, the animated film Ne Zha 2 broke domestic and world records, grossing over $2.2 billion and dominating the global animated film charts. In June, The Labubu figurine from Pop Mart became a viral hit., which increased profits by 396 % and shares by 83 %, as celebrities and people around the world embraced the character. At the same time, Chinese brands sought to capture American tastes: Luckin, Chagee and Mixue chains opened stores in the US. All this shows that 2025 was the year when Chinese „soft power“ broke through into Western cultural markets.
Infrastructure: high bridges, railways and record investments
The year 2025 was extraordinary for Chinese infrastructure. At the beginning of the year, there was an increase in investment in the electricity grid by 33 % and Huawei has opened a supercharging hub with a capacity of 100 MW for 700 heavy goods vehicles per day. Key Belt and Road railway projects were launched abroad, including a 391 km line in Vietnam and a 609 km high-speed line connecting Thailand with China. The end of the year brought two world records: the opening of the bridge Huajiang Grand Canyon Bridge in September, whose roadway lies at an altitude of 625 m, making it the highest bridge in the world, and the opening of Tianshan Shengli Tunnel with a length of 22.13 km, the longest motorway tunnel in the world. These projects and record investments show that 2025 was a milestone for China's domestic and international infrastructure ambitions.
High-tech: biotechnology, brain chips and robotics
The Chinese biotech scene exploded in 2025: Chinese companies participated approximately 50 % on the global value of agreements on the development of innovative medicines. Companies signed major licensing agreements – Fosun Pharma sold the rights to a chronic lung disease therapy for USD 645 million, while CSPC Pharma licensed a GLP-1 weight loss drug for USD 2.1 billion. By mid-year, US companies had signed 14 deals worth up to $18.3 billion, underscoring the attractiveness of Chinese research and development. Meanwhile, digital healthcare grew rapidly: SinoMed's stent system gained FDA Breakthrough Device status and JD Health announced plans for more than 1,000 AI-powered „digital doctors.“. Towards the end of the year, Beinao No. 1, a brain chip enabling patients to control robotic arms and computers. Chinese researchers implanted a semi-invasive brain chip in three paralysed patients, with a clinical trial involving 50 patients planned for 2026. Robotic services became mainstream when „Robots-as-a-Service“ platforms became widespread, crowned by synchronised somersaults performed by Unitree humanoids at Wang Leehom's concert in Chengdu.
Hermes Galvao, Tomáš Kučera & Yereth Jansen
China-insights.com/gnews.cz - GH
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