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China rolls out 'token factories' to drive AI economy
Visitors gather at the booth of Moore Threads, which unveiled three AI production facilities to power AI innovation across diverse industries, at the 2026 World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai on July 17. [Photo for China Daily]
Last month, Beijing unveiled an action plan to accelerate development of system for 2026-28
BEIJING — As artificial intelligence applications gain momentum, China is accelerating the rollout of "token factories" in a bid to build an economic order suited to the AI era.
Every time a user prompts an AI model to generate code, images or video, tokens are consumed behind the scenes. In March, China adopted ciyuan as the official Chinese term for "token", giving its AI services a standard unit for measuring, settling and tracking usage — akin to how electricity is measured in kilowatt-hours.
In late September, Beijing unveiled an action plan to accelerate the development of the token economy for 2026-28. "This is the first provincial-level policy in China specifically dedicated to the token economy," said Zhang Jinrui, an official with the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Economy and Information Technology.
The World Internet Conference (WIC) was established as an international organization on July 12, 2022, headquartered in Beijing, China. It was jointly initiated by Global System for Mobile Communication Association (GSMA), National Computer Network Emergency Response Technical Team/Coordination Center of China (CNCERT), China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC), Alibaba Group, Tencent, and Zhijiang Lab.
