China’s New Push to Attract Foreign Firms, And What It Means for Global Shipbuilding

Despite mounting geopolitical pressure, especially from the United States and other maritime powers, China’s shipyards remain the backbone of global shipping capacity. Its dominance not only rests on volume, but increasingly on high-value, technologically sophisticated vessels. The invitation to foreign players signals Beijing’s intention to combine domestic scale with global innovation, potentially reshaping the competitive landscape in shipbuilding worldwide.

In the following paragraphs I explore the magnitude of China’s dominance, the strategic rationale behind the push for foreign collaboration, and what this might mean for global supply chains and maritime industry dynamics.

China’s leadership in shipbuilding is not new, but it has never been more pronounced. In 2024, Chinese shipyards secured around 46.45 million compensated gross tonnage (CGT) in ship orders, representing about 70% of global ship orders that year. Seven of the world’s top ten shipyards by order volume are based in China. The dominance extends across vessel types: Chinese yards hold roughly 68% of global bulk-carrier orders, and nearly 69% of tanker orders. The momentum is not only in volume but also in technological progress: Chinese shipbuilders are now delivering very large crude carriers, dual-fuel car carriers, ultra-large container ships, and have even launched their first domestically built large cruise ships.

In this context, MIIT’s recent call for foreign investment and partnership is more than symbolic. During Marintec China, the agency publicly welcomed overseas companies and research institutions to join in a “globalised layout of the industry” and said it would facilitate a “reasonable distribution of the industrial chain.” This is a strategic maneuver: by opening up to foreign capital and technology, China can accelerate the adoption of advanced maritime technologies, such as AI-driven design, new-energy propulsion systems, and smart manufacturing, while maximizing utilization of its massive shipyard capacity.

For foreign firms, this represents an opportunity to tap into China’s unrivalled scale and integrated supply chain, but also a strategic risk, as collaboration could further entrench China’s dominance. For the global maritime industry, the result may be a reconfiguration: supply chains increasingly centered around Chinese hubs, a shift of high-end shipbuilding innovation into China, and perhaps a widening capability gap between China and other shipbuilding nations. This may also accelerate consolidation among global shipowners and fleet operators, who may prefer to contract to yards capable of delivering both volume and high-tech performance.

Ultimately, this push by Beijing suggests the next phase of Chinese shipbuilding won’t simply be about building more ships, but about building smarter, greener, and more advanced ships, with global partners. For countries and companies outside China, the shift could force hard choices: to engage with Chinese yards and benefit from economies of scale, or to double down on domestic or allied-nation shipbuilding capacity and risk falling behind technologically and economically.