China's manufacturing industry has the double burden of contributing to the stabilization of economic growth and managing its own structural adjustment (advancement), and faces the double challenge of re-industrialization/developing advanced manufacturing in developed countries and catching up in developing countries. Also, from the West, pressure to correct trade imbalance and protect intellectual property rights are increasing day by day. To respond to this situation, China announced the “Made in China 2025” strategy, which is thought to have great potential impact both domestically and globally, and put it into practice.

“Made in China 2025” is a long-term manufacturing promotion plan with an overarching approach, aiming at adjusting industrial structure, improving labor productivity, formulating an innovation-oriented structure, prompting the evolution of industrialization and informatization integration, and achieving the greening of products and production processes. Because the main axis of the policy is based on realizing advanced manufacturing methods by fusing information technology and manufacturing technology, it is sometimes categorized as a Chinese version of "Industrie 4.0". However, “Made in China 2025” is characteristically different from Germany’s “Industrie 4.0” as imagined by Japanese society, as well as Japan’s Forth Industrial Revolution strategy, which are short-term plans for realizing productivity improvement and autonomy. In this sense, business opportunities can also be found by introducing traditional Japanese technology when implementing "Made in China 2025".

The plan is divided into two stages - 2020 and 2025 – and it sets out final numerical goals for added value ratio and labor productivity. In addition, the ten largest industries upon which special efforts are focused are new industries, including key devices such as materials and parts, equipment industries, and bio and electric cars. Industrial policy practices have market-oriented policies such as deregulation and strengthening intellectual property protection, but there are many aspects which relate to discriminatory fiscal and finance policy, government procurement, and market access. In particular, the structure of industrial support through government investment funds has expanded in scale and attracted attention. However, there is a possibility that such government investment funds will create many inefficient state-owned enterprises.

Amidst the growing voices of concern from the Western world about the Chinese Government’s large-scale support in implementation of its industrial policies, Germany (both the Government and the industrial community) is proactively aiming for businesses chances resulting from the realization of “Made in China 2025” through cooperation between that plan and “Industrie 4.0”. Japanese corporations, which are lagging behind, should respond strategically to this.