china

China has stormed in, aiming directly at its aircraft carriers

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In the Persian Gulf, where it transits near one fifth of world oil, every military movement It has a more than obvious global importance. A single Nimitz-class aircraft carrier costs more than $4 billion and can operate for half a century, while its embarked air wing is equivalent in power to the entire air force of many countries. Moles such as the USS Abraham Lincoln or the USS Gerald R. Ford concentrate thousands of crew and hundreds of aircraft, if you will too, decades of American naval supremacy. However, in that region accustomed to fragile balancesa technological change or a new alliance is enough to alter everything. A pulse that is no longer bilateral. The confrontation between Washington and Tehran can no longer be understood as a direct duel with Russia as the only strategic shadow support. The US naval buildup off the Iranian coast, led by the USS Abraham Lincoln and USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier battle groups, seemed to place the pressure in a classic framework maritime deterrent. However, the scenario has changed and in what way. Washington’s fight against Iran has entered another dimension. It is no longer just Russia supporting the Iranian regime with drones or point systems: China just entered squarely aiming directly at the American aircraft carriers, altering the psychological and operational balance of the crisis. The missile that changes the naval equation. I told it in Reuters exclusive. Iran is about to close the purchase of the Chinese CM-302a supersonic anti-ship cruise missile with a range close to 290 kilometers and designed to fly low and fast, reducing the reaction time of naval defenses. Marketed by the state corporation CASIC as “the best anti-ship missile in the world,” its mere integration into the Iranian arsenal increases the threat about surface units Americans deployed in the Gulf and the regional environment. Now it is not just a technical improvement in an arsenal weakened after the conflict with Israel, but a qualitative leap: for the first time in this crisis, the ability to sink or disable An American aircraft carrier ceases to be a remote hypothesis and becomes a tangible strategic variable. China enters the Gulf board. There is no doubt, the negotiations between Beijing and Tehran are not improvised. I counted the means they carry at least two years brewing in internal meetings, but accelerated after the twelve day war with Israel and have involved numerous trips by senior Iranian officials to China, including the deputy defense minister. In parallel, China has politically supported Iran against the reimposition of sanctions and has intensified its coordination with Moscow and Tehran in joint naval exercises. So much so, that the possible transfer of the CM-302 de facto challenges the embargo regime and symbolizes something deeper: the unprecedented will of Beijing to project power in a region historically dominated by the US Navy. The implicit message is quite clear: if Washington presses with its nuclear aircraft carriers, China responds with missiles capable of putting them at risk. Russia rebuilds Iranian defense from below. It we count a few days ago. As China aims for the sea, Russia strengthens the sky and the ground. The agreement to supply helicopters Mi-28NE attack and Verba portable systems It is part of a rearmament package aimed at rebuilding Iranian capabilities after the degradation suffered against Israel. The Mi-28, optimized for night and low-altitude operations, provide Iran with a modern tool to respond to ground incursions, special operations or amphibious movements in the Gulf. Integrated with drones and precision anti-tank missiles, expand threat density around strategic infrastructures and possible approach routes. They do not redefine the regional balance on their own, but they do thicken the defensive network that any CENTCOM planning must consider. From classical deterrence to multidimensional risk. In short, the United States deploy forces with the intention of deterring or preparing for prolonged attacks if nuclear negotiations fail. Iran, for its part, responds activating military agreements with his allies and rebuilding capabilities losses. What was previously a contained confrontation between Washington and Tehran, with Moscow as relevant partner but indirect, it is now transformed into a strategic triangle where China assumes an active and visible role. If you also want, the Gulf stops being just a regional scenario and becomes a point of friction between great powers. The presence supersonic missile Chinese forces that can directly threaten the symbols of American naval power introduce a new geometry of risk: because it is no longer just about resisting sanctions or negotiate nuclear limitsbut also to calculate how far a crisis can escalate in which the holy grail US military, its aircraft carriers, no longer seem untouchable. Image | US NAVY In Xataka | From space something very dangerous can be seen in Iran: the US cannot do what it did in Caracas if it does not want a massacre In Xataka | If the US attacks Iran with drones, it will find a surprise: Russia has shielded its sky with an explosive weapon, Verba

China has just mounted the largest cannon in its history on the bow of a ship. And that can only point in one direction

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The military balance in Asia was long sustained on an unspoken premise: the technological and operational superiority of the United States was unquestionable. Today that premise is already not taken for granted and, in fact, every nnew movement in the region is forcing us to recalculate times, capacities and margins for maneuver. Because China is “eating the toast” of the rest. A cannon as a symptom. The appearance of a unpublished Chinese naval cannon of 155 mm mounted on a test ship is not an isolated detail, much less a trivial one, but a sign of a much broader trend: Beijing is systematically expanding the scope and versatility of its naval power in coastal scenarios. We are talking about a weapon that, with almost 22 tons of weight and the capacity to fire guided ammunition, represents a leap in caliber compared to the current 130 mm of the Chinese Navy and aims directly at strengthen support capacity of fire in amphibious operations, especially in a hypothetical scenario over Taiwan. More range, more precision, more pressure. The jump to 155 mm is not only a question of size, but technological ecosystem. That caliber opens the door to guided projectiles, high-speed ammunition and even future developments that can offer cheaper and more sustainable alternatives to missiles in certain contexts, something that the United States has also explored with mixed results. China appears to be learning from American missteps (as the Zumwalt case and its prohibitive projectiles) and moving forward with a solution that combines traditional power and ambition without renouncing the logic of saturation war. The design is distinguished from existing large-caliber guns, such as the H/PJ/45, aiming for a caliber of 155 mm. Amphibious warfare as an axis. They counted the TWZ analysts that the new barrel fits into a wider expansion of the PLA’s amphibious capabilities, with large assault ships and auxiliary platforms designed to consolidate beachheads. In this context, long-range naval fire does not replace missiles, but the csupplement with volumepersistence and a lower cost per shot. The strategic signal is clear: China is not only accumulating missiles, but is building a complete range of options to dominate the nearby air and maritime space, especially in its immediate periphery. The Washington Contrast. And while Beijing tests new systems and accelerates development cycles, the United States drags debates on value of naval fire support, cancels programs like the railgun after years of investment and reconverts ships designed for a doctrine that never came together. Washington remains technologically superior in multiple areas, but has shown many doubts in define what combination of systems needed for a high-intensity confrontation against a power on par. China, on the other hand, appears to be aligning its industry, doctrine and production with a coherent strategic objective. A mass pointing in a direction. China has just mounted the bow of a ship largest naval cannon of its history, a structure of almost 22 tons that symbolizes something more than a technical advance. We are talking about a type of investment that is not designed for exhibitions or for routine patrols, but for every specific scenarios where fire sustained over solid ground can tilt the outcome of an operation. In other words, when a power like Beijing adapts its industry, its ships and its doctrine around that type of capability, the message is anything but ambiguous: it is setting the stage for a specific goal. Image | x In Xataka | The new fear of Western fleets is not nuclear. They are conventional submarines armed with surprise and a flag: China In Xataka | China’s best weapon doesn’t fire a single bullet: 300km ‘moving wall’ to close sea routes instantly

Mars was the great space battleground between China and the US. Now it’s the Moon (and the stakes are too high)

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For years, Mars has been the great horizon of space exploration: the inevitable destination to which, sooner rather than later, humanity had to head. Earlier this year, Elon Musk, one of the main drivers of that narrative, assured that The United States could land on the red planet within a period of between five and ten years. In parallel, in China, different voices from its aerospace sector They located the first manned mission Mars around 2033. The message was clear: the race for Mars was already underway. On paper, deadlines are as stimulating as they are challenging. Because sending humans to Mars is not a simple evolution of what has already been achieved, but rather a leap in scale. NASA itself has detailed the enormous technical complexity involved in a mission of this type: from entry, descent and landing systems capable of landing heavy loads in an extremely tenuous atmosphere, to infrastructure that guarantees energy, communications and life support during prolonged stays. Depositing a one-ton rover is not the same as lowering dozens of tons of habitable modules and critical equipment. The race no longer looks at Mars, it looks at the lunar south pole However, while Mars made headlines, the real strategy has been taking another direction. As the NASA Artemis Program and the Chinese Lunar Exploration Program have consolidated calendars, investments and technological milestones, the focus has shifted to a more immediate and pragmatic objective: the Moon. Everything seems to indicate that It’s not about giving up Marsbut to assume that the most sensible path goes through intermediate stages. In both cases, the satellite is emerging as a technological test bed, logistics platform and operational experience before facing a journey of months and millions of kilometers. The new space race, therefore, is not being fought, at least for the moment, at tens of millions of kilometers, but at a few 400,000 kilometers away. This proximity changes the equation: it reduces transit times, facilitates the shipment of supplies and allows us to react to unforeseen events with reasonable margins. But, above all, it opens the door to something that is beginning to take shape: the birth of a lunar economy. Permanent bases, scientific experiments, transportation contracts and infrastructure development could make the Moon not only a destination, but a key node of human expansion in space. The epicenter of this new phase is not just any place, but the environment of the Shackleton craterat the lunar south pole. A permanent darkness, as we can see in the photo that accompanies this article, has fueled the hypothesis that in its shadow areas it could keep water ice. This possibility explains why both the United States and China are targeting this region in their next landings, with the stated objective of studying and, eventually, taking advantage of these resources. In practical terms, we talk about water for consumption, generation of oxygen and production of hydrogen and oxygen as a propellant, whenever technology and economic viability allow it. Illuminated rim and shadowed interior of Shackleton Crater The question, then, is not just what is at the south pole, but what changes if those resources are confirmed as usable. In this scenario, the Moon would cease to be solely a scientific destination and would become a functional piece within space architecture. We are not yet talking about industrial exploitation, but about something more basic: reducing absolute dependence on the Earth in each mission. This nuance introduces a real economic dimension to the lunar race, because it alters the logic of costs, transportation and planning of future operations. This is where the notion of an Earth-Moon supply chain stops sounding futuristic and starts to fit into concrete timetables. Although the lunar economy, with its own supply chainmay seem like a distant concept, its foundations are beginning to be built. On the American side, that architecture is beginning to take shape with very specific missions. Firefly Aerospace launched its Blue Ghost 1 module on January 15integrated into the initiative NASA Commercial Lunar Payload Services. This is a mission that aims to demonstrate what a cargo delivery system would look like for our satellite when it lands on the moon on March 2. In parallel to these cargo missions, Blue Origin is preparing its own movement towards the lunar south pole. The company founded by Jeff Bezos is working on the first demonstration flight of its cargo module Blue Moon Mark 1known as MK1, scheduled for early 2026. The eight-meter-high lander will take off aboard the rocket New Glenn and will need to validate key systems before any more ambitious operations. It should be noted that the mission does not involve resource extraction, but it is a necessary step to operate in the environment where expectations about the ice are concentrated. Render of a multidome base under construction on the Moon The good news is that the MK1 has been tested at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, including thermal vacuum chamber simulations to replicate the extreme conditions of space and the lunar surface. If it passes this phase and the final integration with the launcher, the ship could become a relevant asset for future missions to the south pole. Another important fact is that the US agency you have already selected this module for transport the VIPER rover in 2027whose task will be to search for volatiles such as water ice in permanently shadowed regions. On the Chinese side, the centerpiece is the mission Chang’e 7conceived as a more complex deployment than a simple lander. The mission is targeting August aboard a Long March 5 rocket and will include an orbiter, a lander, a rover and a small jump probe. The set aims to operate in the vicinity of the lunar south pole, where experiments aimed at studying the surface and searching for signs of ice in permanently shadowed regions will be concentrated. Render of Blue Origin’s Blue Moon Mark 1 lander and VIPER If the schedule holds, China could make these measurements before the American … Read more

China has concentrated thousands of fishing boats off Japan, and its idea is not to fish

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The East China Sea is one of the more sensitive scenarios of the strategic balance in Asia for decades. territorial disputes, historical rivalries and the growing weight of new powers have turned these waters into a space where every movement is observed with a magnifying glass. There, apparently minor gestures usually fit into dynamic much deeperand China has just made a move. The diplomatic fuse. Japan’s detention of a chinese fishing boat within its exclusive economic zone, about 170 kilometers from Nagasaki, has rekindled a relationship already deteriorated between Tokyo and Beijing, with a certain island as a backdrop. He captain’s arrestafter refusing an inspection, occurs in a context of growing dispute marked by Japanese statements on Taiwan and the subsequent Chinese warnings its citizens to avoid traveling to Japan. Therefore, it is not an isolated episode, but rather the visible spark of a maritime tension that had been building for weeks. Images from space. AIS system data and the images by satellite show unprecedented concentrations of up to 2,000 fishing boats Chinese aligned near the median line between the two countries in the East China Sea. The formations, hundreds of kilometers long and with vessels separated by less than 500 meters, remained more than 24 hours in static positions despite adverse weather conditions. In other words, China was concentrating thousands of fishing boats off Japan, and its idea is not exactly to fish. The maritime militia and the “gray zone”. They counted on Nikkei that the vast majority of these fishing vessels are part of the so-called chinese maritime militiaa civil network that cooperates with the State and the Army in operations that do not reach the threshold of armed conflict. A priori, this strategy allows pressure to be exerted without formally deploying naval forces, thus making a direct response difficult. In other words, as we count A few weeks ago, what was presented as economic activity could become a test of maritime control or even the interruption of trade routes in the first island chain. Taiwan as a backdrop. Impossible to ignore it. The maneuvers coincide with statements by the Japanese government warning that a crisis in the Taiwan Strait would be an existential threat for Japan. Beijing, for its part, considers the island part of its territory and does not rule out the use of forcewhile Tokyo reinforces its deterrent posture. In this context, each movement in the East China Sea takes on a meaning that goes beyond fishing and is integrated into the regional strategic calculation. A pattern of sustained pressure. Furthermore, the activity is not limited to civil fleets. I remembered the Guardian that the Chinese coast guard has broken presence records around to the Senkaku Islandsalso known as Diaoyu in China, and has released images of patrols in disputed waters for the first time. Plus: the Liaoning aircraft carrier has expanded its radius of operations near Okinawa, while Beijing advances infrastructure on its side of the maritime median line. More than boats, an essay. Analysts interpret these concentrations like exercises of mobilization and coordination within the civil-military fusion plan promoted by Beijing. There is no doubt, the capacity of gather thousands of boats civilians at a strategic point in a short time sends a fairly clear message about the possibility of, for example, saturating maritime spaces without openly resorting to force. In this way, the pulse is no longer so much or only bilateral, but rather a warning to the entire region: China is perfecting tools to shape the balance of the Indo-Pacific, and it is doing so without firing a single shot. Image | Planet Labs, Marine Traffic, Anna Frodesiak, Micromesistius In Xataka | China’s best weapon doesn’t fire a single bullet: 300km ‘moving wall’ to close sea routes instantly In Xataka | China has turned deep-sea salmon farming into an engineering feat. This state-of-the-art boat proves it

700 years of consumption to challenge China

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Whoever follows it, gets it. The world has embarked on the great adventure of finding rare earth anywhere to stop depending on China. Japan, with tense relations – to say the least – was one of the most interested, and has achieved what it been searching for two years: extract rich rare earth mud from about 6,000 meters deep. But it is one thing to find it and another to refine it on an industrial level. Success. Japan had a set schedule: its advanced Chikyu ship had to leave in January 2026 in search of rare earths. In 2024 they reported the discovery of what could be one of the largest deposits in the worldwith a prospecting for the beginning of 2026. The idea was to collect a sample of mud to see the composition, and the results could not have been more promising. ago uus daysnear Minami Torishima Island, Japan signed which is considered the first successful attempt to extract rare earth sediment at extreme depths. We are talking about some mud located in a pit at about 6,000 meters deep, where it is believed that there are a deposit of more than 16,000,000 tons of valuable material. It was an autonomous vehicle deployed at that depth that, using an unmanned excavator, circulated mud from that depth to the ship through a pipe. Similar to the technique used to prospect for oil and gas. Good rare earths. Rare earths are a set of 17 metals and elements that are essential for practically any industry today. From aerospace to medical devices, our mobile phones, electric cars or headphones themselves, they all need some of the metals from rare earths. But it turns out that some are more valuable than others. It is estimated that the lands of the Minami Torishima site stand out due to its concentration in dysprosium and terbium. These two are particularly rare and valuable because they are used in vehicle engine magnets and defense technologies. They also have a certain concentration of yttrium, which is used for lasers or superconductors. The rare earth war. As we read on Al Jazeera, Japan is ecstatic. A government spokesperson commented that this is “a significant achievement both for the country’s economic security and for its maritime development.” And the truth is that the discovery could not have come at a better time for Japan. We have already commented that China is the one that dominates rare earths. Not only its mining, but its production. For decades we have let China refine them because the process is very polluting and the laws in the Asian giant were somewhat more lax. The price has been high: the entire world industry depends on China, and China has not hesitated to use rare earths as a weapon when it has come under attack. For example, in the context of the technological war or with tariffs. liberally. And, speaking of context and war, the Pacific is abuzz. China claims Taiwan and some islands held by Japan while build artificial islands with varied purposes. Japan, meanwhile, has allied itself with a United States that is testing weapons in the area and deploying maritime units. And, furthermore, they are rearming. For that they need rare earths and, on January 6, China prohibited the export of all double items use to Japan. This implies anything that can be used to improve Japanese military capabilities. The order came after the Japanese Prime Minister announced that any action by China in Taiwan It would be responded to in a warlike manner by Japan. The Chinese statement did not specify which exports would be affected, but the Chinese media suggested that heavy rare earths were in the equation. Consumption for a while. That is, in the current context, it is not a whim for Japan to stop depending on China for the production of rare earths: it is a necessity. And there are already media outlets like the Nikkei that have described the deposit as the third largest reserve of rare earths in the world. Estimates point to more than 16,000,000 metric tons of rare earth oxides, something that would satisfy domestic consumption for several generations. For example, it point that there will be more than 730 years of Japanese consumption of dysprosium and more than 420 years of local consumption of terbium. Way to go. Now, Japan has found the clue, but now it is time to confirm the estimates and, above all, start extracting and refining these rare earths. That will be the task of researchers this year to, in 2027, begin carrying out large-scale extraction tests. The idea is to get 350 tons of mud a day. Then everything has to be loaded by boat to Minami Torishima, where a first cleaning of the sludge will be carried out to separate the valuable from the mud and, then, transportation to the continent, where the refining process will take place. With everything in hand, wait that the Japanese government publishes an economic viability report by March 2028. and red flags. It is evident that Japan’s announcement is hopeful both for its independence and for the rest of the world to begin to do something with the deposits it has been finding with the aim of achieving sovereignty in rare earths. But there are also challenges ahead. On the one hand, it esteem that each ton of sludge produces just two kilos of rare earth oxides. This means that enormous volumes of material have to be processed to separate the ‘wheat from the chaff’. Then there is the refining process itself, something pollutant due to what is necessary to do it and the waste that is emitted. And finally, the worry for the habitat destructionspecifically deep-sea ecosystems that, according to environmental groups, would receive an irreversible impact. And since we are what we eat, and more countries like China or Japan than They need fish with no possible alternativeclouds of particles from the seabed can affect the food … Read more

China is building submarines faster than anyone else. And that’s a problem for the United States.

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In a tense geopolitical moment on a global scale with several open fronts such as Greenland, whose melting ice is allowing us to see nuclear submarinesChina just achieved a historic milestone: it is manufacturing nuclear submarines faster than any other country in the world, according to a report by the International Institute for Strategic Studies. This is a complete surprise to the United States, the power that until now held this title, and threatens the advantage that Washington has maintained for decades. Brief notes on nuclear submarines. Without wanting to delve into their characteristics, it is worth distinguishing what types there are: He SSBN is a nuclear-powered submarine designed to launch ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads (some with intercontinental range). They are strategic second response platforms, practically undetectable and guarantee that if someone attacks first, they will receive a response. The SSN/SSGN are nuclear attack submarines (the second, guided missiles), true maritime control weapons: they can attack land or sea targets, block routes and operate for months without resupply. Context. American hegemony underwater lasts for decades, but Beijing has on its roadmap modernize its military capabilities by 2035: it already has the largest surface fleet in the world in the words of the Pentagon and now he has turned on the turbo to reach the last bastion of the United States: the depths. The data. China has surpassed the United States in the pace of launching nuclear-powered submarines (SSN/SSBN). Thus, between 2021 and 2025, the Asian giant launched 10 units compared to Washington’s seven, according to has discovered the IISS through satellite analysis of the Bohai shipyard in Huludao (northern China), as the epicenter of the industrial leap. In a decade, China has gone from being far behind to leading the race: Why is it important. This shift in underwater hegemony has three implications, one of which points directly to the US: Nuclear deterrence. The new submarines Type 094 and future Type 096 They expand China’s nuclear response capacity in the face of possible nuclear attacks. A preemptive attack is strategically unfeasible. Maritime control of commercial routes. SSGNs with high-speed missile systems add a layer of threat to foreign combat groups in the Indo-Pacific, complicating access for the US and its allies to potentially conflictive areas, such as the South China Sea or Taiwan. At a time when The United States is betting on boarding As a sign of maritime control, China has in this fleet a safeguard for its commercial routes. The United States cannot cope with that pace. John Phelan, US Secretary of the Navy, recognized in Congress that “All of our programs are a disaster, honestly. Our best-performing program is six months behind schedule and 57% over budget.” Phelan mentions the erosion of this industry, which according to the Government Accountability Office Today it faces problems such as aging infrastructure and a shortage of qualified labor. The surprise figures. The IISS Military Balance 2025 leaves other interesting figures to better diagnose the reality of both powers in nuclear submarines: Launch rate from 2021 to 2025: seven from the US to 10 from China. The difference in tonnage is notable: while those from China weigh 79,000 tons, those from the US are 55,500. Active nuclear fleet: The United States wins by a landslide, with 65 units compared to China’s 12 units (plus another 46 conventional ones). Quantity vs quality. We have already seen in the previous point that the United States continues to gain in numbers (still) and it is not the only reason for optimism for the country led by Trump. CNN echoes the IISS report where he explains that “Chinese designs are almost certainly behind American and European submarines in terms of quality.” Among other qualities, in noise: Chinese submarines are noisier, which makes them more vulnerable, they explain. But as a captain warns Retired US Navy Half USNI Officer, Biggest Fleets Win. In Xataka | In the midst of rearmament, Spain has just surprised Europe: 5,000 million for 34 warships and four submarines In Xataka | The new fear of Western fleets is not nuclear. They are conventional submarines armed with surprise and a flag: China Cover | CSR Report RL33153 China Naval Modernization: Implications for US Navy Capabilities—Background and Issues for Congress by Ronald O’Rourke dated February 28, 2014 – United States Naval Institute News Blog, Public Domain

China is clear about who should lead the advances of its best AI and robotics companies: Generation Z

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Those who now enter the labor market find themselves with a rival that is difficult to beat: they have no agreement or need for rest or fulfillment. In addition, it does the tasks of junior profiles quite well: artificial intelligence is limiting the landing of Generation Z in the offices. in the United States, we have seen it in the UK and also in the Big Four that make up the Madrid skyline. Replacing those who start working with AI has been revealed as the West’s formula to boost productivity… from the point of view of the bosses. If you have to fight with her and validate her, not so much anymore. But it is by no means the only way, nor does it happen to everyone. In fact, China is betting just the opposite: it is turning Generation Z and millennials into heads of areas as strategic as robotics or artificial intelligence itself. They are not just any young people: they are true galacticos, their best assets. Give me someone young. As collect TechAsiaa trend is emerging in China: that of hiring millennials and young people from generation Z for positions with high-level technical profiles in large AI and robotics companies. The best example is Vinces Yao Shunyu: at 28 years old he has already been at OpenAI. A couple of months ago he returned to his native China to become the chief scientist of Tencent. He now reports directly to the CEO. Shunyu’s is just the tip of the iceberg of this new organizational strategy of Chinese companies. There are other cases, such as that of Luo Jianlan, formerly of Google since a year the chief scientist of AgiBot. Or of Dong Haochief scientist at PrimeBot after earning his PhD at Imperial College. By the way, OpenAI and Meta have copied the recipe: the first with Polish Jakub Pachocki and the second, with the Chinese Zhao Shengjia. They are scientists, but they could just as well be professional footballers: none of them are over 35 years old. Why is it important. When thinking about a boss within a modern business structure of a certain size, it is inevitable that team management, meetings and bureaucracy come to mind. However, this strategy of Chinese big tech is deliberately different from what we have in the West and is based on three reasons that SMCP explains: Institutional separation of research vs. product. A chief scientist looks to the future, he does not manage human teams or budgets. Competitive advantage in a saturated market, allowing you to build your own technologies without depending on third parties. If you have the best at home, you don’t have to ask for permission or sign abroad. The top youth asset. AI is evolving by leaps and bounds and with this movement, China is ensuring that it has those who have been at ground zero of the great milestones of recent years: elite universities or laboratories of renowned institutions such as OpenAI, Google or Princeton. China is a world source of engineers. That China is a country of engineers is no secret: it is a plan that has been underway for 4o years. In fact, now he has opted to go one step further and accelerate doctorates. The Chinese labor market is already showing signs of some saturationwhich has also brought diversification, changing routes to avoid even setting foot in the university in its new bet on FP. In any case, having an army of almost six million engineering professionals gives you an advantage with AI. And it has more than enough: it has engineers to export. Without going any further, the vast majority of signings of the Meta superintelligence team from last year they are Chinese. But young engineers who stay at home have an opportunity beyond joining a leading company in the sector: leading it. Disclaimer: a chief scientist is not a CTO. It is worth remembering a difference between positions that are often confused: a chief scientist is not the director of technology. While the first profile investigates, explores and plans in the medium and long term without touching products or marketing, the second manages teams, designs architecture and meets business objectives. Confuse both profiles or mix them, as the SMCP remembers what Alibaba or Baidu did, ends up subordinating science to the urgency of the market. In any case, it is a fragile position in a company that is not clear why it is needed. In Xataka | China looks at VET: why more and more generation Z students prefer trades over university degrees In Xataka | If Spain wants to imitate China and be a “country of engineers”, this map reveals the extent to which it has a problem Cover | and Hyundai Motor Group and cottonbro studio

Video games have grown a lot this year. But the money goes to China, Roblox and the owners of mobile platforms

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The global video game industry had a turnover of around $185 billion in 2024 and continues to grow. But there is a catch: this growth does not reach the studios or the area that traditional players look at, those of the console wars and the old PC Master Race. Matthew Ball’s usual annual report leaves a less complacent diagnosis: revenue is concentrated in China, on platforms like Roblox and on the owners of mobile operating systems. The rest survive as best they can. The Old Times (2021): There is still talk about how great the year 2021 was for video games. It seems like it was yesterday when the pandemic (insert meme of Grandpa Simpson telling stories to the kids here) confined hundreds of millions of people to their homes, and games (mobile, console, PC, free, subscription) absorbed the benefits of that confinement. As Ball, CEO of Epyllion, analyzes in The State of Video Gaming in 2025the factors that drove that peak were an extraordinary sum of factors: mobile platforms, free-to-play models, games as a service, the cross play and new genres like battle royale and social play. Downhill. The flip side of that was a much bigger recession than expected: global spending on video games fell 3.5% in 2022 and barely recovered a few percentage points towards the end of 2024. According to the consulting firm MIDiA Research, the sector had enjoyed growth of 26.3% in 2020 and 9.8% in 2021, and the rebound was inevitable. According to Ball, the engines that had driven the industry between 2011 and 2021 stopped all at once: the smartphones They were no longer surprising with each interaction, social networks were paralyzed, the free-to-play was normalized. 6.5% of total gaming time in 2023 corresponded to new video games, says Ball, and only four titles shared half of that percentage. Layoffs in full force. He report also speaks how the sector’s layoffs since 2022 illustrate this adjustment: more than 44,000 jobs, 61% of them concentrated in North America. This does not mean that it is the end of the industry or that the same pattern is being repeated. crash 1983, as has been said (the industry is too diversified and globalized to repeat a systemic collapse of that magnitude). What we are paying is the cost of having built a structure designed for an industry in continuous growth during the pandemic. The Chinese monster. Ball puts on the table that global spending on video games grew by approximately $10 billion between 2021 and 2025. But… where did that money go? The report assures that to Beijing: about 4,000 million of that growth is from the Chinese market, and another 1,500 million are from titles developed in China sold in international markets. In total, Chinese publishers have racked up about half of global growth since 2019. And there are more data: Gamer spending in China reached $49.2 billion in 2024, with a base of 722 million active gamers, more than double the total population of the United States. China is already the first market in the world by income. Not foreigners. Very significantlythat market remains almost closed to foreign games. 84% of Chinese gamers’ spending goes on titles produced in China, and that percentage has increased, as unusual as it may seem: 20% of Chinese domestic spending goes on imported titles (a figure that also registered a decrease of 5% between 2023 and 2024). It is comparable to what happens with cinemawith local films devouring foreign ones at the box office. A situation favored by a combination of factors: First, the Chinese regulatory framework favors national titles through a licensing system; second, development costs are substantially lower than in the West; Finally, the work culture of the country’s studios allows for more intensive production cycles. You don’t have to dig far to find examples of great Chinese international successes: ‘Genshin Impact‘, from miHoYo, raised more than $3.5 billion in its first year70% outside China with a character design rooted in anime. ‘Honor of Kings‘, from Tencent, dominated the Chinese mobile market for years before making the international leap with adaptations of character names. AND ‘Black Myth: Wukong‘, developed with support from Tencent, sold ten million copies in its first three days launching in August 2024, betting on the opposite of assimilation: an unequivocally Chinese mythology without thematic concessions to Western taste. Roblox sweeps. The numbers sing: 70% of the growth of the video game market outside of China in 2025 was absorbed by ‘Roblox‘. Which is an infrastructure on which millions of creators build interactive experiences using the platform’s own tools. Players access it for free and spend real money on cosmetic items and access within these worlds, transactions that are carried out in Robux, the ecosystem’s virtual currency. Of every dollar spent,’Roblox’ historically retained around 70% leaving the creator with approximately 25 or 30 cents. In September 2024, ‘Roblox’ announced a new delivery model for paid games that increases the creator’s commission up to 70% on titles that sell for $49.99. What does this translate into? In 2024, ‘Roblox’ paid around $923 million to its creators (an increase of 25% compared to 2023), while its total revenue grew by 29% until reaching 3.6 billion dollars. Its intentions are colossal: CEO David Baszucki stated that the company’s goal is to capture 10% of the global video game content market. Some more questions. Just to finish outlining the portrait: ‘Roblox’ registers sustained net losses (a accumulated deficit of 3.5 billion) with the logic of the platform in the expansion phase, sacrificing immediate profitability. Some observers they point because ‘Roblox’ has become the video game equivalent of YouTube, a platform that extracts value from the work of its creators in the form of data, advertising and infrastructure. And one last thing: two titles on the platform (‘Blox Fruits’ and ‘Brookhaven RP’) each accumulate 60% of the monthly gaming hours of all of Electronic Arts. 30%. If the global video game market reached an all-time high in … Read more

China manufactures 90% of the world’s humanoid robots and the reason is not its industrial policy: it is crossing the street

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On Chinese New Year, 16 Unitree humanoid robots danced a folk dance before almost a billion viewers. The West reacted as always: some with panic, others with disdain, others with an undisguised admiration that sometimes tends to concoct theories with more clichés regarding China than real analysis. None of those answers is entirely true and that blindness has a cost. The context. China manufactures about 90% of the humanoid robots sold in the world. In 2025, about 13,000 units were shipped, with Chinese companies (AgiBot, Unitree, UBTech…) dominating the ranking by volume, according to Omdia data collected by Bloomberg. Tesla, with all its brand reputation and all its industrial apparatus, internally deployed around 800 units of the Optimus that same year. The figure. He Unitree G1 It costs $13,500. He Tesla Optimus will exceed 20,000. That gap is the difference between being able to iterate ten times with the same budget or staying at one. Between the lines. The story circulating in the West has two versions, equally lazy: The first: all this is the five-year plan, the hand of the State, industrial policy made robot. The second, reserved for the most condescending: it is because they copy. Neither of them explains what is really happening. China’s advantage in robotics does not come from the Communist Party. It comes from the Pearl River Delta and the Yangtze Delta: the two densest manufacturing ecosystems on the planet. Motors, actuators, sensors, custom PCBs… everything is available within walking distance. Is what it describes Rui Xuan engineer who has worked in robotics startups in China and Silicon Valley. When Unitree wants to test a new joint design, it crosses the street and comes back with the right component. A team in San Francisco has to wait weeks to receive the same component from China. The background. That difference in iteration speed changes everything in hardware engineering. It stops being a problem of talent, because Chinese and American engineers are equally capable, and becomes a problem of infrastructure. Breaking a robot, learning, replacing it, and trying again: that’s what builds cumulative technical advantage. If breaking a robot costs three weeks of logistics, learning stops and times become longer. Yes, but. China does have state support, and it is completely legitimate to point this out. The government has injected a lot of money into that sector and has set production targets. But it’s not that Silicon Valley is an impoverished region: it has more capital, investors with more experience and resources, and more decades of experience financing high-risk bets. If this were a war to see who has the fattest checkbook, the United States would win handily. But it is not. Furthermore, Chinese state money comes with strings attached: it is classified as “state asset” and founders assume personal liability if the company fails. That pushes capital toward politically safe bets, not necessarily toward the most innovative ones. The question. Can the West make up ground in robotics? Yes, but not like he’s trying. Attracting foreign talent helps on the margin, but does not solve the underlying problem. The equalization involves building local supply chains capable of delivering a spare part in two days, not two weeks. And that is not an immigration or R&D problem. It is an industrial-based problem, and solving it takes many years of work. And of thankless work, from which those who arrive later may reap the fruits. Until then we are going to see many more viral videos of Chinese robots doing pirouettes with increasing naturalness. And it’s because they’ve built the best environment in the world to break things and try again. In engineering, that explains almost everything. Featured image | CCTV In Xataka | Folding clothes or taking apart LEGOs has always been a tedious task. Xiaomi’s new AI for robots has put an end to it

The US is obsessed with achieving General Artificial Intelligence before China. China couldn’t care less

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The promise of the AGI has become the “the wolf is coming” from some AI companies. The gurus of American AI companies do not stop hype with the long-awaited general artificial intelligencethe one that will surpass humans in all areas of knowledge. Meanwhile, In China it doesn’t seem to matter too much. The AGI gap. Elon Musk, Dario Amodei, Sam Altman…everyone agrees that the AGI is about to fall, or so they have said at some point. We cannot know how close they are, what we do know is that to achieve AGI they need more computing power, for which they need a lot (more) money. The AGI as a justification for an insane investment. They count in High Capacity that China barely mentions AGI in its 2025 AI+ initiative nor did it mention it in the ‘Next Generation AI Development Plan’ 2018. AI is a strategic technology of great importance, but they focus on specific applications such as industrial automation, autonomous driving or robotics. Transformative, yes, but not turning points that will change the world completely. Whoever arrives first wins (or not). It’s American logic in this race. To achieve this, they are betting everything on one horse and AGI is the goal. If they arrive before, they will obtain an insurmountable economic and military advantage: they will have won. On the other hand, if China arrives before, the power relationship would change completely. The truth is that things have to go a lot wrong for the US to not win this race. The problem is that, while they are making this titanic effort, China is beating them on other fronts such as the electric car, industrial robotics, drones, solar panels… Win the AI ​​battle, but lose the economic war. China is calm. Why aren’t China so excited about AGI? To begin with, it is not so clear that scaling the models is the fastest route to AGI and that requires a gigantic investment with no guarantees. But above all it is because they do not buy the idea of ​​”arriving first”; Even if the US overtakes them, they can simply copy them and catch up quickly. Yao Shunyu said itchief AI scientist at Tencent: “History shows that once a technical pathway is validated, Chinese teams can quickly replicate it and even surpass it in specific areas, such as electric vehicles or manufacturing.” The question is not so much who gets there first, but who makes the best use of it. Who does talk about AGI in China. Yao Shunyu’s statements occurred within the framework of the AGI-Next Summit, where several leaders of Chinese AI companies met to talk about the future of the sector. Figures such as the founder of DeepSeek, the CEO of Ziphu or the founder of Moonshot have talked about their goal being to achieve AGI, although they have not shared many more details. Maybe the company that Alibaba has gone deeperwhich gave a presentation detailing its plans to achieve superintelligence (ASI). These leaders, like those of American companies, may have commercial motivations in these statements, but there are other organizations in China that are investigating this field such as the Beijing Institute for General Artificial Intelligence or the Chongqing Institute for General AI. There are initiatives, but there is nowhere near the level of obsession that they have in the US. A restful strategy. While the US hoards chips and scales like crazy, in China they are choosing to do it more slowly. They are prioritizing national chips and open source with the idea of ​​promoting the adoption of their models. It is a more long-term vision. A long distance race, not a sprint. In Xataka | There is a city in China that goes head to head with Silicon Valley: welcome to Hangzhou, the home of the ‘Six Little Dragons’ Image | Steve Johnson in Unsplash

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