From high-speed rail to electric cars to batteries to AI, it’s clear that China can operate with incredible speed at massive scale. Can the US still compete?

We sat down with Dan Wang, a Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution and the author of “Breakneck: China’s Quest to Engineer the Future” to discuss.

Timecodes:

0:00 Introduction

1:36 Lawyers vs. Engineers: Cultural and Economic Differences

4:06 Urban and Rural Life: Comparing Infrastructure

7:20 Barriers to Progress: Regulation and Governance

11:00 Industrial Policy and Public-Private Partnerships

14:20 The Double-Edged Sword of Legal and Engineering Mindsets

16:50 Social Engineering and Policy in China

23:00 Competition, Intellectual Property, and Business Culture

27:10 Manufacturing, Scale, and Global Supply Chains

36:00 Lessons from Japan and Korea

41:30 Complacency, Quality, and the Future of Competition

48:45 Strategic Resources and Industrial Policy

54:00 Foreign Policy: Engineering Diplomacy vs. Alliances

59:00 Taiwan, Demographics, and the Future of US-China Relations

Resources:

Follow Dan on X: https://x.com/danwwang

Read Dan’s blog: https://danwang.co/

Buy Breakneck on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1324106034/

Follow Steven on X:

https://x.com/stevesi

Stay Updated:

Find a16z on X

Find a16z on LinkedIn

Listen to the a16z Podcast on Spotify

Listen to the a16z Podcast on Apple Podcasts

Follow our host: https://twitter.com/eriktorenberg

Please note that the content here is for informational purposes only; should NOT be taken as legal, business, tax, or investment advice or be used to evaluate any investment or security; and is not directed at any investors or potential investors in any a16z fund. a16z and its affiliates may maintain investments in the companies discussed. For more details please see a16z.com/disclosures.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Huawei AI Chips Contain Advanced Parts from Rivals

Bloomberg Tech

Perplexity Launches Comet Browser to Compete with Chrome

The AI-powered Podcast Player