On the morning of September 10, 2026, the 2026 CIFTIS Global (China) Service Design Conference was held at Shougang Park in Beijing. Under the theme "From Service Economy to Service-Oriented Society: Technology Inspires, Design Empowers," the event was co-hosted by the World Green Design Organization and the Beijing Guanghua Design Development Foundation, with collaborative support from Tongji University, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, University of Science and Technology of China, and Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts. Over 200 delegates from government agencies, universities, enterprises, tech innovation platforms, investment institutions, and industry organizations attended, including Jiang Yaoping, former Vice Minister of Commerce; Wang Yanhua, Deputy Director of the China Service Outsourcing Research Center; Zhao Xinli, Academician of the International Eurasian Academy of Sciences and Vice Chairman of the China Innovation Design Industry Strategic Alliance; Xin Xiangyang, Chairman of the China Service Design Conference and Dean of the College of Design and Innovation at Tongji University; Kong Rong, Deputy Director of the Art Development Center of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism; and Xu Yi, co-supervising doctoral advisor and Associate Director of the EMBA Center at the School of Management, University of Science and Technology of China. Participants engaged in in-depth discussions on service design's industrial value, AI applications, standards development, talent cultivation, and international expansion, exploring how service design can drive industrial transformation, business innovation, and upgrades to social services.

From 'China' to 'Global': Service Design Enters a New Phase

This year's conference debuted under the new name "Global (China) Service Design Conference," signaling more than just a title change. It reflects China's service design sector entering a new stage of development: shifting from importing and learning international methods to establishing knowledge and methodology systems rooted in Chinese practice; moving from single-touchpoint experience optimization to industrial upgrading, systemic innovation, and social value creation; and evolving from serving the domestic market to linking global resources and participating in international cooperation. Professor Xin Xiangyang, Chairman of the China Service Design Conference and Dean of the College of Design and Innovation at Tongji University, put forward the key concept of "from service economy to service-oriented society." A service-oriented society entails not only broader service supply capacity and higher quality assurance but also consumption upgrades across broad demographics, from survival-oriented spending to development- and enjoyment-oriented consumption. The conference theme thus represents both the demands that a high-quality service industry places on service design and the strategic opportunity—and responsibility—for service design to participate more fully in economic and social life.

Industrial Empowerment Effect Takes Center Stage: Service Design as a Value Multiplier Across Sectors

Service design is no longer a creative adjunct to business operations but a systematic tool that drives industries up the value chain and amplifies input-output ratios, with an empowerment multiplier reaching 200 times, validated across policy, academic, and industrial practice. Jiang Yaoping, former Vice Minister of Commerce, noted in his opening address that with the advancement of the "AI+" initiative, service design is accelerating toward the center of the industrial stage, with AI and service design achieving deep, bidirectional integration. With services now accounting for two-thirds of the global economy, service design faces a golden development opportunity. He urged leveraging this convergence by strengthening standards, building platforms, solidifying the digital foundation, and improving the talent system—a four-pillar strategy to reshape the service trade landscape and contribute Chinese wisdom. Wang Yanhua, Deputy Director of the China Service Outsourcing Research Center, presented striking figures: China's service outsourcing contract execution value has grown from $1.38 billion 20 years ago to $300 billion, market entities have expanded from 500 to over 90,000, and practitioners have grown from under 60,000 to 17.65 million, with the industry shifting from "world factory" to "world office." He emphasized that service design is "not just surface-level experience optimization but a move toward systemic restructuring," noting that the 2025 Action Plan for Promoting High-Quality Development of Service Outsourcing, issued by the Ministry of Commerce and five other departments, explicitly supports the creation of national-level service design centers and encourages the integration of industrial and service design. He proposed four directions: innovation-driven activation of new productive forces, standards development as a foundation, deepened international cooperation to polish the China service brand, and reinforcement of the service design engineer talent system, with AI tool proficiency incorporated into core talent evaluation criteria. Zhao Xinli, Executive Director of Silk Road Innovation Lab, academician of the International Eurasian Academy of Sciences, and co-chair of the Maritime Silk Road Innovation Design Alliance, described service design as a systemic innovation tool that bridges intelligent technology with industry, people's livelihoods, and international cooperation. It can channel technology into the real economy, amplify industrial value, empower inclusive welfare, and build cross-border collaborative bridges, leveraging government-industry-academia-research synergy to support the construction of a service-oriented society.

Key Findings from the 2026 China Service Design Report

Professor Xin Xiangyang, Chairman of the China Service Design Conference and Dean of the College of Design and Innovation at Tongji University, presented an analysis of the "2026 China Service Design Report" under the title "Service Design: Industrial Competitiveness and Employment Growth." Key data points include: the tertiary industry accounted for 57.7% of GDP in 2025; the service trade deficit narrowed from RMB 1,502.49 billion in 2019 to RMB 827.82 billion; and Morgan Stanley projects China's humanoid robot labor market penetration will reach 39% by 2050 (versus 26% globally and 35% in high-income countries). The report provides the first systematic statistics on service design positions: 67% of salaries are at the average level, nearly one-third exceed average, and 31.72% of practitioners reasonably expect monthly salaries of RMB 20,000–25,000, with employment entry points covering user research, journey optimization, and AI service innovation. From the perspective of "two-industry integration" (manufacturing and services), Xin noted that manufacturing enterprises can achieve transformation and upgrading by integrating upstream scientific and technological resources and downstream channels and operations, offering "holistic solutions" rather than individual products. This represents a major development opportunity for service design in China—exploring both high-quality development of the service industry and strategic paths for tertiary/secondary industry integration from a comprehensive, industry-wide service perspective, rather than merely optimizing mature service experiences.

Diverse Practices Demonstrate Service Design's Industrial Value

In the conference's keynote segment, speakers from space environment, financial research, intelligent hardware, automotive services, media, internet platforms, legal services, technology innovation, quality management, and supply chain services shared service design practices across industries. Wu Duan, Dean of the Bay Area Innovation College at Guangzhou Academy of Fine Arts, presented on "The Digital Humanities Turn in Space and Environment Disciplines." Using spatial big data to CT-scan cities and AI agents to simulate 10,000 people's spatial cognition, he cited the Lingnan Painting School Memorial Hall renovation case—transformed from interior decoration to a "sunken plaza" public space reconstruction—illustrating how service design's systems thinking can break disciplinary boundaries and drive cross-disciplinary integration and value innovation. Li Tiandong, Director of the Think Tank Center at Fudan University's Financial Research Institute, pointed out that service design has often been misunderstood as "improving experience," "optimizing processes," or even a business cost. However, calculations show service design moving from the back office to the front line, from cost item to value item. From 2004 to 2024, service design's share of enterprise value rose from approximately 10.9% to 20.5%, reaching about 36.3% in scientific research and technical services in 2024. "In the past, we asked how much service design costs; now we should ask how much enterprise value service design can retain," Li said, because "the end point of service design is not making consumers feel more comfortable, but turning needs that wouldn't have occurred into transactions, and turning one-off transactions into long-term value." In his view, service design fundamentally changes not just interfaces and processes but also converts potential demand into real markets, one-time consumption into sustained relationships, and operational investment into customer stickiness, pricing power, replication capability, and long-term competitiveness. "Service design is not a company's 'renovation cost'; it is becoming a company's 'value engine.'" Zhang Boning, Design Director at Anker Innovations, used smart hardware globalization as evidence: "Service design is the trust engine for smart hardware globalization," potentially delivering an additional 40% growth value and breaking the industry's parameter competition and price war dilemma. Unlike traditional homogeneous hardware competition, service design runs through R&D, channels, and marketing, transforming technological innovation into perceivable user experiences, leveraging word-of-mouth for efficient conversion and organic dissemination, and shaping high-end brand value through scenario-based narratives. Its smart home brand eufy, supported by the 'Man & Base' local computing hub, achieves a 48.85% gross margin, with product premiums 1.6–2.5 times that of traditional white-label companies. Zhang noted that domestic hardware technology already leads globally, and service design can fill the trust gap in overseas expansion, amplifying the value of technology and brand investment for excess premiums and sustained positive growth. Qiu Yi, Head of Ecosystem Operations at NIO's Power service platform, illustrated with NIO Power's over 120 million battery swaps, one-touch APP services, and door-to-door pet feeding touchpoints how NIO uses a "ripple model" instead of the 4S store's "funnel model," where vehicle delivery marks the start of service. Value-led guidance and a comprehensive "recruit-train-manage-evaluate" system for outsourced personnel jointly support high-end service premiums. He Hanfu from Guangzhou Daily, citing XR-based "Loushanguan Battle," AI digital human government exhibition halls, and the BHI corporate brand health model, proposed four evolutions for service design: from event to context, information to experience, audience to participant, and content to service ecosystem. Li Jingbo, Design Operations Lead at Xiaohongshu, offered the judgment of a "human-AI symbiotic service network": agents are advancing from Q&A to execution orchestration, with Master Agents driving Sub Agent collaboration, and each $1 invested in agents generating approximately $4.6 in revenue. The platform's "Dian Dian" life assistant draws its corpus from real user posts rather than machine-generated content, signaling a comprehensive rewrite of service network supply structures, cost curves, and value centers. Ma Dongxiao, partner at Zhonglun Law Firm, addressed "How Designers Protect Their Designs" from a legal professional perspective, analyzing protection pathways for design innovation outcomes. He discussed the applicable boundaries of patent, copyright, and trade secret systems, noting that designers and design institutions need to select appropriate intellectual property protection methods based on project characteristics, with particular emphasis on trade secrets' role in protecting specific design outcomes. He reminded designers that "if you don't protect confidentiality yourself, the law won't protect you." Cai Jun from Think-Cloud, positioning as a "tech brand translator," used the CPU model to translate the hardcore AI of Zhixiang Weilai into perceptible dual-city experiences, allowing "More Local, More Global" to grow into real industrial value. Liu Shichang from Lianjia demonstrated, through a "quality-efficiency-scale" positive cycle, AI-unified complaint tagging, and 60-point baseline/90-point advanced standards, that even low-frequency, high-ticket intermediary industries can use service design for community support. Ding Chunfa, founder of Dafang Gong AI Hardware OPC·Hub, shared explorations in serving super individuals and startup teams, proposing that through supply chain systems, global innovation networks, and industry-academia-research collaboration, connecting technology R&D, hardware manufacturing, entrepreneurship services, investment, and overseas markets can accelerate AI hardware innovation's industrial transformation and globalization.

Multilateral Roundtable: Manufacturing-Services Integration Achieves Enterprise-Level Consensus

The roundtable dialogue was moderated by Xu Yi, co-supervising doctoral advisor at USTC's School of Management and Associate Director of the EMBA Center. Cross-sector guests including Cao Sanxing, Deputy Dean of the Institute of Internet Information at Communication University of China; Zhang Wenming, Head of Skyworth's National Industrial Design Center; Zhao Bing, After-Sales Management at Volkswagen Anhui Digital Sales Service Co.; Ye Ying, Deputy General Manager of Hefei Scenario Company at the University of Science and Technology of China Silicon Valley Platform; Zhang Qi, Suzhou Branch Head of Spirax Sarco Engineering (China) Co.; and Wang Yaomin, Head of the Service Design Center at Zhengxing Technology Co., engaged in thorough discussion on the conference theme. Grounded in the real economy and anchored to the national trillion-yuan service industry development goal, the dialogue focused on co-building national service design centers and establishing industry standards, proposing that industry norms must be rooted in real industrial scenarios, balancing institutional constraints with innovation vitality, and rejecting one-size-fits-all approaches. Addressing the pain point of uneven talent quality, guests proposed strengthening the composite service design engineer workforce, promoting dual-track linkage between university disciplinary innovation and corporate training, and consolidating the industrial talent foundation. The dialogue balanced local practice with international perspectives, covering G-end and B-end application scenarios, completing a closed loop from academic research to industrial implementation, and offering pragmatic insights for service design industry development.

Outcomes Released: Standards, Talent, and Cases Take Root

The conference unveiled multiple landmark outcomes, consolidating the dual foundation of industrial empowerment and talent cultivation at the institutional level, driving the service design industry from experience-based practice toward standardized, systematic development. At the joint launch ceremony for "Service Design Industry Standards Development," Professor Cao Huai, Deputy Dean of the School of Design at Huazhong University of Science and Technology, explained the policy value and industry significance of standards development. He noted that this effort aligns with the "Service Trade Standardization Action Plan (2026–2030)" issued by the Ministry of Commerce and the State Administration for Market Regulation in April, responding to national deployment for advancing creative design service standardization. Current issues in service design—inconsistent delivery standards, missing quality evaluation, and misaligned industry understanding—hinder professionalization and scale development. With AI reshaping the entire process of solution generation, prototyping, quality control, and deliverable handoff, industry standardization is urgent. The standards development is led by the Beijing Guanghua Design Development Foundation with joint participation from universities and leading enterprises. Xu Yi, member of the SWTC10 Standards Committee under the Ministry of Commerce's Department of Service Trade and Deputy Director of USTC's EMBA Center; Professor Xin Xiangyang; Li Shouqiang, Design Sequence Qualification Director at iFlytek; Li Jingbo, Design Operations Lead at Xiaohongshu; Qiu Yi from NIO; Liu Shichang from Lianjia; and Sun Haizhen, Executive Secretary-General of the Foundation, jointly participated in the standards development launch ceremony, committing to build a service design industry standards system to support high-quality industry development. Service Design Engineer certificates were awarded to successful candidates, including: Senior Service Design Engineers Chen Zhiyong (Skyworth National Industrial Design Center design expert), Huang Tingjun (Assistant Dean of Xi'an Eurasia University), Lin Liangjing (General Manager of Zhongli Tea Industry (Fuzhou) Co.), Liu Xuzi (General Manager of Tibet Yuerong Culture Development Co.), Qin Licai (Director of Shenzhen Le De Culture Co.), Tang Tingting (Executive Deputy Director of Xiamen Kehong Eye Hospital), Zhang Wenming (Head of Skyworth National Industrial Design Center), and Zhang Xiaohua (Process Technology Head at Skyworth National Industrial Design Center). Service Design Engineers included Zha Jingmei (Co-founder of Wuhan Rujun Education Technology Co.), Guo Xuyang (Director of Government-Enterprise Services at Zhili Property (Shanghai) Development Co.), Huang Jingyi (Business Training Specialist at BYD Auto Industry Co.), Li Qiang (Display Multi-Product Head at Skyworth National Industrial Design Center), Li Shuangying (Project Manager at Qinghai Hongmei Medical Housekeeping Services Co.), Qiao Hongjing (Pre-Research Design Supervisor at Plus Research Institute), Pan Jiening (Founder and Training Director of Lu San Ling Culture Co.), Pang Zhenhui (General Manager of Zhanjiang Zhenhui Cultural Consulting Co.), Qu Sai (Domestic Product Head at Skyworth Industrial Design Center), Yan Hao (Senior Project Manager at Shanghai Yande Business Consulting Co.), You Huayun (Training Director of Hunan Nv Gong Zi Culture Media Co.), Zhang Hongxia (Training Director of Ningbo Yixu Enterprise Management Consulting Co.), and Zhang Yun (Project Supervisor at Wuhan Textile University's Corporate Image Design Center). Certificates were also presented to members of the "2026 China Service Design Report" editorial committee, winners of the 2026 Excellent Service Design Cases (commercial track), winners of the 2026 Excellent Service Design Cases (concept track), 2026 Excellent Service Design Mentors, and 2026 Excellent Service Design Institutions.

Consolidating Chinese Practice, Building a Service-Oriented Society

From improving a single service experience to restructuring an entire business process; from driving enterprise innovation to empowering industrial transformation; from AI technology implementation to enhanced public services and social welfare—service design is entering ever-deeper levels of economic and social development. The 9th Global (China) Service Design Conference, leveraging the national-level opening-up platform of CIFTIS, accomplished multiple missions including policy interpretation, trend analysis, outcome releases, talent certification, industry-education linkage, and international exchange. It marks a shift in Chinese service design from method importation to knowledge creation, from localized application to systematic construction, and from domestic practice to global collaboration. Looking ahead, the Beijing Guanghua Design Development Foundation will continue to unite government departments, universities, research institutions, industry organizations, and enterprises to advance the service design standards system, talent system, case database, and international cooperation platform, further refining the service design industry innovation ecosystem. On one hand, this means fully unleashing service design's industrial empowerment multiplier, amplifying the value-amplifying effect of design across industries. On the other, it means consolidating the talent foundation through service design engineer certification, ensuring standardized talent supply to secure industrial value realization. By exporting Chinese service design solutions, standards, talent, and cases, China will continue to strengthen its service trade innovation capacity, competitiveness, and global voice, supporting the achievement of service industry development goals and contributing design power to the construction of a service-oriented society and Chinese-style modernization.