Can Productive Computing Capacity Power Future Industries? Evidence from China

As future industries expand, a key question is whether computing resources can move beyond installed infrastructure and become a productive capacity deployable in industrial activity. This study introduces Productive Computing Capacity, a composite productive capacity centered on computing power and jointly organized through network transmission, data storage, and energy support and computing efficiency conditions. Using panel data for 30 Chinese provinces from 2013 to 2024, we construct a provincial Productive Computing Capacity Index (CPCI) with normalized entropy weights and estimate two-way fixed-effects models. Productive Computing Capacity is positively associated with future industry development. The association between the CPCI and favorable decoupling is positive but only marginally significant. Although the reported linear probability interaction coefficients are positive, they are not treated as hypothesis-confirming moderation evidence because validated nonlinear robustness estimates and simple slope confidence intervals are not available. By conceptualizing computing resources as a regional productive capacity, this study extends research on computing power and digital infrastructure while maintaining cautious inferences about sustainability and causality.