In the late 1940s and early 1950s, the United States and the Soviet Union were locked in a race for technological and ideological supremacy.

The Cold War was still in its early years and each side was intently focused on the other’s scientific and military progress. The US believed it was firmly in front.

So the Americans were caught almost completely off guard in October 1957, when the Soviet Union successfully launched Sputnik-1, the world’s first ever artificial satellite, into orbit.

Today, the US is locked in competition with a different superpower: China. In recent years, China has given the world some surprise breakthroughs of its own – from advanced hypersonic missiles to cutting-edge computer chips and powerful artificial intelligence (AI) models.

The question is, how did China get there – and what can other countries like Australia learn from it?

Decades in the making

A recent study by the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) in the US sought to better understand Chinese innovation by examining about 14 million Chinese patent publications from between 1985 and 2023.

Its findings suggest these modern “Sputnik moments” were not isolated strokes of luck, but were instead decades in the making.

The study noted that Chinese patent activity in critical technology areas (as defined by the US Department of Defense) has been growing.

The number of new patents has steadily increased from fewer than........

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