Several hundreds of representatives and company executives from the Chinese mainland and Taiwan island gather in Nanjing, East China's Jiangsu Province to explore opportunities for cooperation and forge joint efforts to enhance competitiveness on December 15, 2025. Photo: Chu Daye/GT

Companies from both sides of the Taiwan Straits said that they see vast opportunities in the digital economy as the country continues to push for high-quality growth in the next phase of development. Business executives spoke at a supply chain cooperation event in Nanjing, East China's Jiangsu Province, on Monday, ahead of the 2025 annual conference of the Cross-Strait CEO Summit, which is set to be held from Tuesday to Wednesday.

Amid increasingly complex changes affecting global industrial and supply chains, rising unilateralism, and geopolitical disruptions, building bridges of cooperation among companies across the Straits has become a focal point of discussion. Several hundred representatives and business executives from the mainland and Taiwan island gathered on Monday in Nanjing to explore opportunities for cooperation and forge joint efforts to enhance competitiveness.

Lei Hong Yi, director-general of the Council for Industrial and Commercial Development from Taiwan island, pointed to the next phase of development of the mainland, which put emphasis on high-quality growth, technology self-reliance, building a modern industrial system, fostering new quality productive forces, and promoting consumption, people-centered development and green development. 

Lei said that Taiwan companies and entrepreneurs should find great opportunities in the fields of technological innovation, industrial upgrade and the mainland's vast consumer market.

"The digital economy will be a key area, and Taiwan businesses should actively get involved in this new development pattern on the mainland, and further promote and deepen the integrated development of industrial and supply chains from both sides of the Taiwan Straits," Lei said.

Some representatives from Taiwan also noted that the upgraded demand of mainland companies is a boon for regional businesses.

Along with the industrial upgrade in the mainland, "a growing number of mainland companies also have higher requirements for the products and services being offered to them, and they often come from new industries, and we believe that this is an opportunity for us," Kai Hsiao, deputy general manager of Fansys, an environmental protection company from Taiwan, told the Global Times on Monday.

Fansys manufactures exhaust gas equipment for use at venues such as electronic semiconductor plants, pharmaceutical chemical plants and petrochemical plants. 

The trend of cooperation is felt both ways. Liu Tao, a manager at the China Unicom Jiangsu Branch, told the Global Times on Monday that as digitalization progresses during the upcoming 15th Five-Year Plan period (2026-30), Taiwan companies will have more demand for industrial upgrades and system management, as well as going abroad, and "this offers broad opportunities for a digital service provider like us."

Jiangsu is one of the key localities bearing witness to the deep cooperation among companies from both sides of the Taiwan Straits.

According to officials attending the forum, Jiangsu has cumulatively approved 32,000 projects with Taiwan investment, and it has attracted overall investment of $90 billion. The province also accounts for about 20 percent of all of the mainland's trade with Taiwan island.

About 800 people, including entrepreneurs, experts and scholars from across the Straits, will attend the 2025 annual conference of the Cross-Strait CEO Summit, the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council said on December 10.