Science- and technology-based msmes are the main players in science, technology and innovation, and are important agents in nurturing new qualitative productivity and promoting high-quality economic development. At the same time, most of these enterprises are in their infancy, long-term, and the characteristics of light assets, heavy research and development, and lack of collateral often expose them to difficult, expensive and slow financing。
In recent years, financial administrations and banking financial institutions have continued to improve the financial services system, facilitating the accurate flow of credit resources to science-based msmes. According to the statistical report issued by the people's bank of china on loans to financial institutions in the first quarter of 2026, as of the end of the first quarter of this year, there were 303. 3 million science- and technology-based small and medium-sized enterprises receiving loan support, with a credit acquisition rate of 50. 4 per cent, 0. 2 percentage points higher than at the end of the previous year。
“the bank's widespread establishment of science and technology branches and the promotion of credit-based products such as `co-lending' `intellectual property pledge' have effectively alleviated the financing difficulties of light-asset science and technology enterprises.” leung fei peng, a researcher at the china postal savings bank, said in an interview with the financial times journalist。
Steady credit expansion
The data show that by the end of the quarter of this year, the foreign-currency sme loan balance stood at 4. 03 trillion yuan, an increase of 20. 9 per cent over the same period, which is 1. 1 percentage points higher than at the end of 2025. “this indicates that financial resources are increasingly tilted towards micro- and micro-regions.” lufti peng indicates。
Since the beginning of this year, the real economy of large state-owned banking services has continued to grow and credit support for science, technology and innovation has not only increased in volume but also increased in quality. The focus on the development of small and medium-sized enterprises (msmes) in science and technology (smes) has been painful and difficult to finance, and there has been a steady improvement in the coverage, availability and accessibility of smes through the continuous optimization of financial services models and the refinement of innovative financing systems。
According to the quarterly report of the listed bank, by the end of the quarter, the bank's branch loan in china had increased by nearly rmb 1. 1 trillion, with a balance of more than rmb 6 trillion invested in science and technology; and the bank's services and technology enterprises had more than 110,000 households and a balance of rmb trillion。
The balance of construction bank loans in science and technology amounted to 6 trillion yuan, an increase of 14. 31 per cent over the end of the previous year, and more than 350,000 service enterprises; the size of cbi debt servicing increased by 496. 45 per cent over the same period, with the establishment of a cumulative pilot fund of 38 financial asset investment companies (aics) to support the full life cycle development of business start-ups through a “business + investment” service model。
“as a whole, the continuation of the trend of `quantitative growth' in science and technology credit from large state-owned banks is amply indicative of the fact that the banking sector is moving away from the crude credit lending model and is working to promote the precision and specialization of credit lending, and that the suitability of financial resources and creative entities has increased significantly.”。
Exploring new paths to intangible asset financing
In the high-end equipment manufacturing workshop in tianjin port, the production equipment was operating at a high rate, and the stone in the heart of the person in charge of the construction of heavy equipment in the open ocean (xinjin) company, ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “the heavy equipment in the open ocean”) finally landed。
A few days ago, the postal bank, tianjin hong kong, carried out a loan of $15 million from the company, which, like a “timely rain”, precisely broke the financing bottlenecks of the company and opened a new path to intangible asset financing in tianjin finance。
As the lead company in the domestic petrochemical core towers, the ocean heavyweights, thanks to continuous technological innovation, are firmly in the lead in the industry and have accumulated a pool of gold-rich core autonomous patents. But behind the luminous business card is a long-term financing problem — as a typical “research-and-development, light-asset” enterprise, with dozens of high-quality patents and lack of traditional collateral. As the pace of technological upgrading, expansion of production capacity and the development of new products accelerated, the pains of inadequate credit lines became more pronounced, which at one time constrained the growth of the enterprise。
“for the most part, traditional intellectual property pledge loans, which are merely additional guarantees, cannot actually increase the total amount of letters of credit, and the patent value of light assets businesses has been underestimated.” the relevant head of the general finance department of the tianjin branch of the bank of the postal reserve, who understands the “growth troubles” of the company, is able to identify the strength of financial services. Faced with the financing difficulties of the ocean-intensive workers, postal banks have broken the traditional credit mentality and abandoned the inherent model of “heavy, light intangibles” and tailored financial solutions for businesses。
The core breakthrough of the $15 million loan, known as the first substantial credit enhancement model of the tianjin branch of the postal reserve bank, is to reverse outright the role of the guarantor of intellectual property rights — no longer as a “contribution” of subsidiary credit additions — but as a direct central basis for crediting, relying on an increase in the crediting level of the enterprise's core patent, to truly transform intangible assets into development capital of “real silver”。
Building a “technology-industry-finance” virtuous circle
After more than 10 minutes of communication, the application for an enterprise loan of $10 million, with a three-year term of three years, was made. The significant increase in the efficiency of financing has been the result of an innovative new model for inclusive enterprises - the “free-of-charge plus credit” financial synergy - launched in anhui province in march this year。
It was understood that the model would break the data barrier for government enterprises and that the government would share the financial awards obtained by enterprises with financial institutions to provide a basis for credit awards. Based on this mechanism, the bank of commerce and industry has pre-approved credit lines for enterprises using artificial intelligence tools to embed corporate awards data, etc., in the original master model for awarding. Bank staff, with their services at the door under the pre-certification program, have significantly streamlined their filings to avoid the difficulty of running many times to their enterprises and have effectively eased the financial pressure on start-ups due to high investment in prior research and development。
As can be seen, the financial synergy service model is a vivid practice of eco-coherence in support of science, technology and innovation。
“in the future, financial resources will focus more on hard technology and early start-ups, promoting a virtuous cycle of science and technology, industry and finance.” according to lou fei peng, banks will deepen the lending linkage model by building a “loan + direct outside” full life-cycle service; replace traditional collateral with a big data wind, with a precise picture of the start-up business; and improve risk compensation mechanisms, with multiple government, bank and guarantee share of the cost of testing。
Indeed, single financial services are no longer able to meet the needs of sti-based msme enterprise development, and the banking sector needs to promote a further extension of the service boundary from financing to creating a synergetic ecosystem of gpsr。
According to lou fei peng, banks can link the technology sector, the high new zone, incubators, and higher education research institutes to create a corporate incubator to provide “policy interface + finance advisers + technology conversion” services. In addition to credit support, integrated services such as settlement, cash management, exchange-rate risk avoidance, listing counselling, wealth management, etc. Accompany enterprises from their inception to their listing throughout the cycle。
