China's IT sector to gross 12.5 trillion yuan

TIANJIN - The sales revenue of China's information technology sector will hit 12.5 trillion yuan (about $2.04 trillion) this year, a Ministry of Industry and Information Technology official has forecast.

In the first nine months of 2013, the sector's sales revenue reached 8.98 trillion yuan, up 14 percent year on year, said Ding Wenwu, chief of the ministry's electronics and information department, at the 13th China Tianjin Information Technology Exposition, which opened in Tianjin on Thursday.

China's information technology sector has maintained stable growth in the past three years, with its output of mobile phones, computers and color TV sets world leading, according to Ding.

With new developments such as the Internet of Things, cloud computing and big data, the information technology sector faces new growth opportunities, he said.

The ministry will underscore innovations in the sector to enhance its core competitiveness and promote the consumption of information products and services, and deep integration between industrialization and informationization, the official added.

China aims to boost the consumption of information products and services and make the sector a new engine for domestic demand and economic growth.