The nation will seek to maintain strong digital growth momentum by conscientiously developing the booming internet of things (IoT) sector, according to the country's top industry development regulator.

"The internet of things is a crucial support for digital economic growth," Miao Wei, minister of industry and information technology, said on Saturday during the ongoing World Internet of Things Expo in Wuxi, Jiangsu province. "Embracing the IoT will bring new opportunities for economic and social development, as it helps give impetus to industrial transformation and upgrading and promotes energy saving and emission reduction as well as streamlined management."

According to Miao, more efforts are needed to make breakthroughs in key technologies such as chips and smart sensors, actively apply new industrial internet technologies and products to key industries, accelerate development of the internet of vehicles, and secure the internet of things.

"Blossoming new technologies are driving the rapid development of the IoT, including artificial intelligence, block chains, cloud computing, and 5G," said Yang Jie, chairman of China Telecom Corp.

Yang urges further efforts to set IoT standards, build up its infrastructure and security system, and explore new business models.

IoT, the concept of connecting electronic devices such as speakers and refrigerators to the internet, is expected to create market value of more than 1.5 trillion yuan ($218 billion) by the end of 2018, the Annual IoT Industry Development Report of China (2017-2018) forecasts.

Sun Pishu, chairman of Chinese key server maker Inspur Group, noted the industrial internet was key to the integration of the internet, cloud computing, big data, AI and the real economy.

"We need to increase the investment and build up the industrial internet operators, which will help small and medium-sized companies to better embrace digital transformation," Sun added.