On June 1, 2026, China officially issued the new plan for deepening state-owned enterprise (SOE) reform covering 2026 to 2029, kicking off a new three-year reform cycle for state-owned capital and enterprises. Different from previous reform rounds that emphasized scale expansion, the new plan focuses on high-quality development, targeting future industrial layout, state-owned asset value appreciation, and optimized market-oriented operation mechanisms. The policy clearly requires central and local state-owned enterprises to increase capital layout in forward-looking future industries, including artificial intelligence, low-altitude economy, quantum technology, and biological manufacturing. These strategic emerging tracks are regarded as the core driving force for China’s long-term industrial upgrading and new productive forces development. Meanwhile, the reform mandates SOEs to accelerate the divestment of inefficient and loss-making assets, streamline redundant business sectors, and concentrate resources on core competitive businesses. It further deepens mixed-ownership reform, introduces flexible market-oriented salary and incentive mechanisms, and breaks rigid institutional constraints that restrict operational vitality. In addition, the new rules strengthen state-owned asset supervision, prevent asset loss, and establish a full-cycle performance evaluation system centered on core competitiveness, profit quality and technological innovation capabilities. The adjustment will effectively reverse the previous extensive development model of some SOEs. Economists pointed out that the new round of SOE reform will optimize the overall layout of the national economy, enhance the leading role of state-owned capital in strategic emerging industries, and provide solid institutional support for stabilizing industrial chains, promoting technological breakthroughs and boosting high-quality economic growth.