(Yicai) May 15 -- The growth of China's digital industry accelerated in the first quarter of this year, driven by strong profits in the electronics and information manufacturing sector.

Revenue of China's digital industry rose 13 percent to CNY9.5 trillion (USD1.4 trillion) in the three months ended March 31 from a year earlier, compared with a 9.4 percent growth in the same period last year, according to data released by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology yesterday.

The top 10 Chinese provincial-level regions by digital industry revenue, including Guangdong, Jiangsu, Beijing, Shanghai, and Zhejiang, generated a combined revenue of CNY7.9 trillion in the first quarter, up 14 percent from a year earlier, accounting for 83 percent of the total and contributing 89 percent to the overall growth.

The industry’s total profit surged 23.6 percent to CNY737.8 billion (USD108.5 billion) in the period, versus a 7 percent increase a year earlier, MIIT data also showed. The profit margin improved to 7.8 percent from 6.8 percent.

The digital industry is the core of the digital economy, encompassing telecommunications, electronics and information manufacturing, software and information technology services, and internet-related sectors.

As of March 31, China had 4.96 million fifth-generation network base stations in operation and 32 million 10-gigabit passive optical network ports capable of gigabit network services, with 5G-A coverage extended to 330 cities.

In terms of computing power, China had 14.45 million standard server racks in active use at computing centers as of the end of March, with intelligent computing capacity reaching 1,882 exa-floating point operations per second, supported by more than 70 high-capacity computing corridors built around major computing hubs.

The value-added output of electronics and information manufacturing companies above the designated size expanded almost 14 percent in the first quarter from a year earlier, outpacing the overall industrial growth by 7.5 percentage points. Their operating revenue rose 15 percent to CNY4.31 trillion, and their profit surged 1.3-fold to CNY217 billion.

Seven of nine electronics and information manufacturing sub-sectors posted positive profit growth in the period, with electronic components manufacturing reporting the strongest gains.

Digital services remained stable. China's telecom service volume grew 8.3 percent in the first three months of the year from the same period last year. Software revenue rose 12 percent to CNY3.5 trillion. Internet and related service providers above the designated size saw their revenue increase 11 percent to CNY502.7 billion in the period, up from 1.2 percent a year earlier.

Editor: Futura Costaglione