Abstract: The theoretical interpretation of China's digital industry catch-up practice can help clarify the general laws of China's digital industry development, form a theoretical framework based on the“Chinese experience”, and further guide the rapid and healthy development of China's digital industry. Starting from typical facts of the development of the digital industry, this paper constructs a theoretical framework of the spontaneous mechanism of“technological conditions -- endogenous driving force -- factor endowment”to explain the rapid development of China's digital industry. On this basis, it is proposed that the institutional system composed of the industrial policies and the competition policies plays a positive role in maintaining the spontaneous mechanism of the digital industry, including: The spillover effect of the institutional system consolidates the infrastructure support position under the background of multi technology linkage, the phased evolution of the system stimulates the endogenous driving force of the development of the digital industry, and the coordination between the institutional environment and technological order takes into account the development and standardization of the digital industry. The current development of the digital industry still faces new challenges: The spontaneous mechanisms and the institutional maintenance are not sufficient conditions for improving the efficiency of the digital industry, and spontaneous mechanisms are prone to creating“institutional gaps”at the governance level. These two aspects constrain the role of spontaneous mechanisms in the digital industry. Therefore, policy recommendations have been put forward to reshape the spontaneous mechanism of the digital industry, including adhering to the transformation of industrial policies towards functional directions, optimizing competition policies through responsive regulation, and introducing the“gatekeeper”function of platform enterprises.

Key words: digital industry, industrial policy, competition policy, spontaneous mechanism, institutional guarantee