The Internet of Things (IoT) is not merely a technological trend; it represents a paradigm shift that is fundamentally transforming the global economy. According to recent analyses, the number of IoT endpoints worldwide is expected to reach an astonishing 18.8 billion by 2024, marking a year-on-year growth of 13%. Furthermore, projections suggest that this figure will soar to 41 billion by 2030. This dramatic increase underscores the IoT's pivotal role as a cornerstone infrastructure for advancing the digitalization, networking, and intelligent transformation of economies and societies. A striking estimate from McKinsey indicates that IoT technologies could contribute an impressive $12.6 trillion to global economic growth by 2030. Scholars and industry experts alike have reached a consensus on the IoT’s transformative influence on traditional industries, its power to inspire innovative business models, and its potential to empower sustainable development practices across various sectors. Yet, there's a compelling angle that brings a fresh perspective to the significance of IoT: the expansive role it plays in enriching high-quality data supply.

In 2019, China emerged as the first nation to formally recognize data as a crucial production factor, thereby establishing its position as a pioneer in data factor theory. Following this landmark recognition, a series of government documents outlined a comprehensive top-level design aimed at recognizing data ownership, facilitating market transactions, establishing rights distribution, and protecting interests. The ultimate goal is to cultivate a cohesive national data market and advance the market-driven allocation of data as a productive resource. Fast forward to October 2023, the National Data Bureau was officially established, tasked with coordinating and advancing the foundational institutional frameworks for data and providing oversight for the integration, sharing, and utilization of data resources.

The IoT serves as a vital technology for sensing the real world and constructing digital twins. By facilitating the real-time collection and forwarding of multi-dimensional data related to production contexts, economic operations, and social governance, the IoT stands as a foundational technology for generating data elements. As of 2023, the total number of mobile network connections in China reached approximately 4.059 billion, with cellular IoT user accounts soaring to 2.332 billion. This extensive network is applied across various domains such as public services, connected vehicles, intelligent retail, and smart homes, with users numbering 799 million, 454 million, 335 million, and 265 million, respectively. Additionally, over 94,000 application cases of 5G technology have been implemented across 71 sectors of the national economy. These statistics highlight how the growing proliferation of IoT applications continuously generates vast amounts of high-value data, which are being utilized in virtually every facet of economic and social development. This landscape reveals three principal mechanisms by which the IoT unleashes a "multiplier effect": collaboration optimization, reuse for increased efficiency, and fusion innovation.

The first mechanism, collaboration optimization, enhances economic operational efficiency and boosts total productivity. Data reduces the impact of information asymmetries, strengthens both entity coordination and task synchronization, leading to optimized resource allocation and improved market operational efficiency. A prime example of this is Shein, a fashion retailer which utilizes data to seamlessly integrate its processes from research and development to design, marketing, warehousing, logistics, and after-sale services. This innovative approach has significantly heightened the efficiency of new product design while enabling a flexible, data-driven business model that allows for rapid responses to market demands—far outpacing traditional giants like Zara and H&M.

In addition to driving internal cost reductions and business innovations, data enables coordinated transformations in the supply chain above and below. For example, Qingdao Haier’s Caos platform connects approximately 900,000 upstream and downstream enterprises, providing services to 160,000 companies and empowering the creation of 11 "lighthouse factories" recognized globally, which have revolutionized production organization methods.

The second mechanism is the reuse of data for enhanced efficiency. As IoT technologies deeply intertwine with production, economic operations, and social governance, vast amounts of knowledge and skills become encoded into data. Digitalized knowledge exhibits unique characteristics that allow for low-cost, scalable reusability across various entities and contexts. If the industrial economy achieved the large-scale replication of physical products, the digital economy enables the large-scale replication of knowledge and skills. A salient example is the use of large models which interact with proficient employees to "extract" and encode skills into data that can be reused across other personnel within an organization, thereby boosting overall workplace productivity. By accelerating knowledge diffusion and technological spread, the low-cost reuse of data elements can significantly shorten innovation cycles and foster macroeconomic growth.

The third mechanism, fusion innovation, encourages shifts in scientific paradigms and enhances technological innovation capability. By integrating data elements into specialized knowledge domains, combining them with domain expertise can help uncover new patterns, develop novel theories, and create fresh knowledge or technologies. A prime example of this is DeepMind’s AlphaFold, which leverages biological information data analytics and deep learning for groundbreaking advancements in understanding protein folding. Through the sharing and circulation of data elements, resources and technologies can proliferate across different industries, facilitating deeper integration and spawning new industries and services. Tesla exemplifies this through its collection and analysis of vast vehicular data, continuously optimizing vehicle safety and efficiency using autonomous driving algorithms based on Full Self-Driving (FSD) technology and proprietary AI innovations from its Dojo supercomputer.

Viewing the development and application of IoT technology through the lens of "data elements" offers a fresh understanding of the interrelationship between technological innovation and economic growth while also promoting new avenues for driving economic advancement. In this context, "connection" emerges as the foundational aspect of IoT technology, whereas "circulation" acts as the prerequisite for data elements to unleash their multiplier effects. To fully unlock the value of IoT technology and leverage the multiplier effect of data elements, cooperation among nations on technological research and development, data governance, and standard-setting is paramount. Currently, China is actively engaged in cross-border collaborations on digital infrastructure projects while strenuously promoting international interoperability of data elements. By aligning with international frameworks such as the Digital Economy Partnership Agreement (DEPA) and the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), China aims to establish a new landscape of open and mutually beneficial cooperation for digital economy development at high levels.