BEIJING, Nov. 5 (Xinhua) -- Hamza Aboelgasim, a senior manager for growth at the Masdar City Free Zone in Abu Dhabi, capital of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), has a busy calendar these days.
"We welcome six or seven Chinese companies setting up operations in the zone every month," he said. He travels regularly between China and the UAE and plans to open the zone's fourth China office in Beijing to connect with more Chinese firms.
This plan brought him to the Beijing International Investment and Trade Conference 2026, held late last month. The two-day event drew institutions and delegates from over 20 countries and regions.
"We received applications from more than 30 companies ahead of the conference and finally settled on six for one-on-one meetings," Aboelgasim said. "Chinese companies are setting up offices, building factories and conducting R&D in Abu Dhabi."
Official data show that China's outward direct investment reached 213.58 billion U.S. dollars in 2025, up 11.1 percent year on year. By the end of 2025, China had set up 58,000 enterprises overseas across 189 countries and regions.
Consulting firm Roland Berger said in a report this year on China industry trends that Chinese companies are expanding their overseas investment footprint and gradually shifting from a simple export model to a "glocalization" model.
For companies like Beijing Yunji Technology Co., Ltd., this shift is already underway. "Going global is not about selling the same product in a different place," said Xie Yunpeng, chief development officer of the company.
Citing hotel delivery, the company's main overseas scenario, as an example, he explained: "The Middle East has a lot of indoor carpeting, so robots need targeted modifications and training to move on carpets."
Yunji Technology's robots have entered more than 20 countries and regions. In 2025, the company's overseas revenue reached 19.06 million yuan (about 2.84 million U.S. dollars), soaring 92.1 percent year on year.
"We advance localized adaptation for different markets and work with local partners to develop products, channels and after-sales services. In the first half of this year, our overseas revenue was nearly seven times that of the same period last year," Xie said.
Cross-border data flows are another way in which Chinese companies are expanding overseas. Luo Xiaoheng, chief strategy officer of PaXini AI, a Beijing-based company founded five years ago and focused on tactile sensing technology, said at the conference that in May this year, the company had completed its first cross-border data transaction for embodied intelligence.
In PaXini's data collection workshop, staff wearing self-developed five-finger tactile collection gloves perform real-world tasks such as grasping, assembling and sorting in more than 10 scenarios, including automobile manufacturing, healthcare and retail.
"Compared with laboratory data, overseas demand for real-world scenario data far exceeds supply," Luo said. In embodied intelligence, China has advantages in tactile sensors and real-world data capture that are scarce in overseas markets, he added.
Lyu Xiaotong, an investor in several Chinese embodied intelligence companies, had just stepped off the stage following a roundtable discussion at the conference when a Qatari guest stopped him to ask for help connecting with specific companies.
"Now is the best time for Chinese firms to go global," Lyu said. In his view, a significant information gap remains between Chinese and foreign markets and companies, and platforms like the Beijing International Investment and Trade Conference are exactly what is needed to close this gap at the negotiating table. ■
