The most distinctive feature of the digital economy is the use of data as a key factor of production.

Digital economy is a new economic form developed by human society, and nowadays it is increasingly becoming a new driving force of global economic development, occupying an important position in global economic development. Many countries and enterprises are actively developing the digital economy to seize the new heights of economic growth.

Different from the agricultural and industrial economies, where land, labor and capital are the key factors of production, the most distinctive feature of the digital economy is that it takes data as the key factor of production, and the effective use of network information technology as the core driving force to enhance total factor productivity and optimize economic structure.

In recent years, China's digital economy has gained high speed and vigorous development. Statistics show that in 2017, the scale of China's digital economy reached 27.2 trillion yuan, accounting for 32.9% of GDP, and the scale of the digital economy has jumped to the second in the world.

With the significant progress of new-generation information technology such as big data, cloud computing, and the Internet of Things, new artificial intelligence application scenarios are constantly being developed and tapped. The deep integration of the digital economy and traditional industries has become a strong driving force leading China's economic development.

Characteristics of China's digital economy development:

Unlike developed countries in the West, China's digital economy development has its own characteristics, that is, China has ushered in informatization before completing industrialization, urbanization and agricultural modernization. The "synchronization of the four" has become the background for the development of China's digital economy. This has brought both great challenges and unprecedented opportunities for the development of digital economy in China.

Informatization makes it possible for China to complete the process of industrialization, urbanization and agricultural modernization that western developed countries have completed in two to three hundred years in two to three decades, in which the digital economy has become a key driving force.

Taking the retail industry as an example, the United States has experienced hundreds of years of industrialization and a high degree of integration before the emergence of Wal-Mart as the representative of the efficient modern retail industry. China, on the other hand, with the help of networked information technology, has formed the world's largest e-commerce market in the past 10 years or so, giving rise to giant e-tailing enterprises such as Alibaba and Jingdong.