By Liu Zhonghua, People’s Daily

German management scholar Hermann Simon coined the term “hidden champions” to describe small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that operate below the public radar yet dominate their niche markets — typically ranking among the top three globally in their sector. These firms are distinguished by deep specialization, relentless innovation, and a fundamentally global mindset.

Having visited China over 70 times and closely tracked its industrial evolution, Simon remains deeply optimistic about the vitality of its SME sector. In an exclusive interview with People’s Daily in Hasborn, Germany, he noted that China has systematically cultivated a new generation of “hidden champions” through a phased support framework tailored to different stages of enterprise development.

He spoke highly of China’s achievements in technological innovation, industrial upgrading, and through a phased support framework tailored to different stages of enterprise development. He emphasized that Chinese companies have already emerged as global innovators across several cutting-edge industries.

“The outdated notion that China merely replicates foreign technology no longer holds,” he said. “Chinese enterprises are now leading the way in innovation within multiple advanced fields.”

According to Simon, China’s approach centers on long-term strategic commitment. “The country guides its specialized firms to focus on foundational technologies and pursue continuous, incremental innovation. This disciplined approach is essential for overcoming core technological bottlenecks and securing dominant positions in global niche markets.”

He highlighted China’s five-year plans as a key driver of industrial clarity and strategic foresight. “Well-calibrated assessments of emerging sectors provide businesses with clear developmental pathways, showcasing strong institutional coordination,” Simon explained. 

Strategic top-down planning, he added, helps consolidate resources, foster fair competition, and nurture globally competitive leaders. Strategic top-down planning, he added, helps consolidate resources, foster fair competition, and nurture globally competitive leaders. For other developing nations seeking to industrialize, he suggested studying China’s long-term strategy: leveraging domestic strengths to target distinctive niche industries and cultivate high-value-added champion enterprises offers a practical, scalable model.

Beyond macroeconomic growth, Simon underscored the role of these specialized firms in advancing balanced regional development and shared prosperity. 

While large corporations typically concentrate in megacities, many “hidden champions” are rooted in counties, smaller cities, and townships.

He pointed to Shandong Moris Tech, based in Shouguang, east China’s Shandong province, which expanded its specialty chemical operations across regions while remaining rooted locally. “Nurturing these highly specialized enterprises distributes high-skilled jobs and value creation across broader urban and rural areas,” Simon observed. 

“This provides a viable pathway toward more equitable regional development and inclusive prosperity.” Simon also pointed to China’s unparalleled industrial ecosystem as a major competitive advantage. With over 2,000 German firms operating manufacturing facilities in the country, he noted that dense supply chains and clustered industrial parks remain powerful draws. 

“Comprehensive infrastructure, a vast talent pool of engineers, and a massive domestic market make China an ideal testing ground for advanced manufacturing technologies and their large-scale deployment,” he said. “Ignoring the Chinese market would mean forfeiting access to one of the world’s largest industrial hubs, which accounts for nearly one-fifth of global industrial output.”

He added that China’s resilient domestic demand offers multinational companies valuable medium- to long-term certainty.

Consequently, many German “hidden champions” have established R&D centers and integrated value chains in China, leveraging the country’s open, dynamic ecosystem to extend their corporate lifecycles.

China’s well-developed and open market is not only a growth engine for “hidden champions” worldwide, but also an important source of their core competitiveness, Simon said.

As competition intensifies across niche industries worldwide, greater coordination and collaboration among specialized companies in Europe and China could become an important force in reshaping the global industrial landscape, Simon said.

Two-way investment between Europe and China can help improve structural imbalances in trade and economic ties. As Chinese companies accelerate their localization efforts in Europe by establishing R&D and production bases and creating local tax revenue and jobs, economic and trade cooperation between China and Europe can evolve from one-way trade in goods toward joint industrial development, helping mitigate the risks posed by trade barriers.

Regular in-person exchanges can also strengthen business trust, stabilize expectations for industrial investment and help reduce misperceptions arising from geopolitical competition, Simon said.

Reflecting on the past two decades, Simon acknowledged that China’s manufacturing sector has undergone profound transformation. Many specialized enterprises have significantly upgraded their technological capabilities and product quality, successfully surmounting key innovation challenges.

Looking forward, he cautioned that Chinese companies still face hurdles in three areas: deepening their international footprint, building globally recognized brands, and executing localized overseas investments.

“I hope more Chinese manufacturers will expand into European and U.S. markets, achieving tangible progress in brand globalization; promote balanced and mutually beneficial industrial investment between China and Europe; and help preserve a stable, predictable global trade environment while safeguarding supply chain continuity,” Simon said.

“By deepening cooperation between Chinese and foreign real-economy sectors on the basis of openness, connectivity, mutual benefit and win-win outcomes, we can help safeguard the long-term stability and development of global industrial and supply chains,” he concluded.

By He Yin, People’s Daily

Veteran participants of China-U.S. “ping-pong diplomacy,” now well over seventy years of age, have returned to China, passing on to a younger generation the torch of friendship lit by the “little ball” that helped set the “big ball” of China-U.S. relations in motion.

Today, that tradition continues on the pickleball courts, where young Chinese and American players are forging new bonds. Embodying the ethos of “sportsmanship before victory,” they are proving that shared passion can transcend borders.

From table tennis, which helped open the door to China-U.S. exchanges 55 years ago, to pickleball, now increasingly popular among young people in both countries, this passing of the “little ball” from one generation to the next over more than half a century vividly demonstrates the enduring vitality of people-to-people exchanges between China and the United States and the deep, lasting friendship between the two peoples.

This year marks the 55th anniversary of China-U.S. “ping-pong diplomacy.” In 1971, a modest table tennis match shattered years of diplomatic isolation, reopening channels of communication and laying the groundwork for normalized relations. The event remains a landmark moment in modern diplomatic history. 

Over the decades, numerous initiatives have deepened mutual understanding. Pioneering cultural missions, including performances by the Philadelphia Orchestra, helped lay the foundation for sustained artistic exchange. Meanwhile, the historic Kuliang friendship keeps alive a people-to-people friendship spanning a century. Together, these efforts have woven a rich tapestry of shared experiences.

In the new era, the spirit of engagement embodied in “ping-pong diplomacy,” which brought the Chinese and American peoples closer together, is taking on new forms and gaining new vitality. 

Games like pickleball, known for their accessibility and social nature, effortlessly bridge linguistic, cultural, and geographical divides. For young Chinese and American athletes meeting for the first time, the court becomes a space for mutual learning, teamwork, and genuine connection.

These interactions reaffirm a fundamental truth: sustained people-to-people ties remain the bedrock of resilient China-U.S. relations, providing the trust necessary to navigate challenges and steer bilateral engagement forward.

Strong interpersonal connections are essential to stable diplomatic relations. Looking to the long-term development of friendship between the Chinese and American peoples, in San Francisco in 2023, Chinese President Xi Jinping proposed an initiative to invite 50,000 young Americans to China for exchange and study programs in a five-year span. 

In just over two years, the number of young Americans who have visited China for exchanges has surpassed 50,000, achieving the target ahead of schedule. Driven by the initiative, a growing wave of American youth are traveling to China to explore its landscapes, engage with emerging technologies, and experience daily life firsthand. 

By witnessing China’s developments directly, these visitors are moving beyond media narratives and algorithmic echo chambers, replacing stereotypes with nuanced, personal insights about mutual potential as partners and friends.

Many returnees have taken to social media to share their journeys, offering unfiltered perspectives to audiences back home. Their posts highlight how China’s rich heritage coexists with rapid innovation, while emphasizing the warmth, hospitality, and openness of its people.

As young Chinese and American travelers continue to bridging vast distances, they are planting seeds of mutual respect and shared curiosity. With time and cultivation, these connections will take root, fostering a more resilient, pragmatic, and constructive future for China-U.S.relations.

Today, China-U.S. relations once again stand at a critical juncture in history, and the strategic choices made by the two countries will once again shape the course of the world. 

By making friends and competing within the rules on the pickleball court, young people from China and the United States are offering valuable lessons for the two countries on how to interact with each other. 

Just as players on the court must follow the rules, China and the United States must coexist peacefully on this planet and refrain from crossing red lines or overstepping boundaries on issues concerning each other’s core interests. 

And just as athletes improve through learning from and competing with one another, China and the United States should explore ways to expand areas of cooperation and do more things that benefit both countries and the wider world. 

In recent years, young people from China and the United States have worked side by side aboard research vessels to unlock the mysteries of the ocean and joined forces at maker competitions to explore solutions to global challenges, demonstrating through action the enormous potential for cooperation between the two countries. 

Looking ahead, the steady and sustained development of the “big ball” of China-U.S. relations will continue to depend on countless “little balls” of people-to-people friendship. People from all sectors of both countries, especially the younger generation, should draw wisdom and strength from history, get to know and grow closer to each other through exchanges and cooperation, and move forward together by learning from one another. By strengthening the bonds of friendship, they can make new contributions to stable, healthy and sustainable China-U.S. relations.

A small ball can connect people across mountains and seas; a bond of friendship can transcend time and space. 

Just as pickleball draws on the strengths of several sports, the vast planet we share has ample room for China and the United States to pursue their respective development and achieve common prosperity, and for different civilizations to complement and enrich one another. 

China remains committed to expanding people-to-people and cultural exchanges with the United States, writing a new chapter of friendship between the two peoples, and injecting a steady stream of people-to-people strength into building a constructive China-U.S. relationship of strategic stability.

By Li Zhiwei, Wang Yuan, Bai Ziwei, People’s Daily

In Pennsylvania, the United States, the Allegheny River winds through Pittsburgh. Just east of the city lies the township of Plum, where Ronald Sakolsky, known to his Chinese friends as “Sai Kaosi,” has called home for many years.

“Part of my heart is still in China.” Upon returning recently from a trip across the Pacific, Sakolsky found it difficult to hide how deeply he missed the country.

His living room is filled with mementos from his travels. The sofa is covered with photos he brought back from his trip. But his most treasured keepsake is a large cross-stitch embroidery presented to him by Yin Yuzhen. Green leaves symbolizing peace surround a globe, with China and the United States stitched in different colors. The Chinese characters meaning “one earth, one dream” capture the deep friendship that has grown between Sakolsky and Yin over more than two decades.

“Yuanfen” — a special bond or sense of destiny — is the word Sakolsky repeatedly uses in Chinese when talking about his story with China. “It’s all yuanfen,” he said.

In 1999, at the age of 40, Sakolsky was a history teacher at a middle school in Pennsylvania. By chance, he came to Luoyang, central China’s Henan province, to teach through a China-U.S. teacher exchange program.

One day in October that year, he turned on the television as usual to watch the news. On the screen was a vast stretch of desert, where a petite Chinese woman from a rural area was carrying a bundle of tree saplings taller than she was. And that woman was Yin Yuzhen.

“I suddenly burst into tears,” he recalled. Deeply moved by what he saw, he thought, “I have to do something.”

For the next two months, Sakolsky searched everywhere for a way to make a donation. Eventually, he found a charitable organization willing to provide $5,000 with no conditions attached. Sakolsky insisted that every cent of the money go toward helping Yin plant trees.

In the spring of 2000, Sakolsky traveled to the Mu Us Desert in the Inner Mongolia autonomous region in north China. As he watched Yin plant the frail-looking saplings, he could not help wondering: Could a desert really be turned into a forest? It seemed impossible.

The second day after returning to China in August this year, he stood in the forest that had been planted with the $5,000 donation. Yin had named it “Sai Kaosi Forest.”

The dream he had once thought impossible had become a reality. More than 50,000 trees now grow there, forming a vast forest.

At the airport, he and Yin embraced in tears after 26 years apart. The following day, they planted another evergreen tree together as a symbol of their friendship.

“I have hugged Americans, and I have hugged Chinese. The feeling is the same,” Sakolsky said repeatedly after his latest trip to China.

Since returning home, he has been sharing his experiences online and reconnecting with old friends. Last week, he spoke to about 50 neighbors in his community, and soon he plans to address nearly 1,000 residents in Pittsburgh.

“We’ve sparked a flame of people-to-people exchange. Now, we just need to keep it burning,” he said.

He picked up a photo taken during his trip to China, showing him and Yin leaning against each other’s shoulders and embracing in tears.

“If I had to choose one photo to represent the friendship between the American and Chinese people, it would be this one,” he said. “This photo tells the whole story. It captures everything about this friendship.”

“The American and Chinese people share the same basic human goodness. Both have kindness in their hearts,” Sakolsky said.

In his view, Chinese and Americans both love their families, hope their children can have better lives, cherish peace and want to make the land beneath their feet a better place. These shared values matter far more than the differences brought about by nationality, he said. They form the simplest and most genuine foundation for people-to-people exchanges between China and the United States.

Outside the window, two newly planted green plants stand side by side on the lawn in front of Sakolsky’s, with the national flags of China and the United States fluttering nearby.

He said he had deliberately planted the two flowers in the front yard as a symbol of his hopes for friendship, peace and the protection of the shared planet.

“People-to-people friendship works. Our story will continue, just like the forest in the Mu Us Desert thousands of miles away, growing year after year,” Sakolsky said.

Stories of people coming to know and understand one another will continue to cross the ocean, putting down new rings of growth, one after another.