Bulletins

Another big data exchange opens in Shanghai

It could be a way to juice economic growth in the era of big data.

Another big data exchange opens in Shanghai

Data exchanges have become a popular concept among China's local governments as a way to find new economic growth in the big data era.

Photo: Getty Images

The Shanghai Data Exchange, open for trading as of Nov. 25, is China’s latest effort to facilitate data transactions between companies.

In recent years, data exchanges have become a popular concept among China's local governments as a way to find new economic growth in the big data era.

On its first day of trading, 20 data products were on offer, sold by a mix of Shanghai-based companies and the Shanghai branches of national companies, including the three major telecom operators, China Eastern Airlines and JD Technology. Among the first few brokered deals, the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China bought enterprise energy consumption data from Shanghai Municipal Electric Power Company to better inform its corporate banking business, Chinese publication Securities Times reports.

The first Chinese data exchange was established in the southwestern city of Guiyang at the end of 2014, followed by a few similar ventures elsewhere in China. But these exchanges have gone off the radar since 2017 and performed disappointingly, according to Chinese media. 2021 has witnessed a renewed interest in data exchanges, with Beijing setting up its own in March and Shenzhen plotting to build another for the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau region.

Zeyi Yang

Zeyi Yang is a former reporter with Protocol | China. Previously, he worked as a reporting fellow for the digital magazine Rest of World, covering the intersection of technology and culture in China and neighboring countries. He has also contributed to the South China Morning Post, Nikkei Asia, Columbia Journalism Review, among other publications. In his spare time, Zeyi co-founded a Mandarin podcast that tells LGBTQ stories in China. He has been playing Pokemon for 14 years and has a weird favorite pick.

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