Shanghai has become the most competitive city for integrated circuit industry development in the Chinese mainland, Yicai reported on Tuesday.

Beijing grabbed second place, followed by Shenzhen in South China's Guangdong province, and Wuxi in East China's Jiangsu province.

Chengdu in Southwest China's Sichuan province came in fifth place and Xi'an in Northwest China's Shaanxi province in sixth place. They were followed by Wuhan in Central China's Hubei province, Hefei in East China's Anhui province, and Nanjing and Suzhou in East China's Jiangsu province.

Shanghai considers the integrated circuit industry one of its three major industries, covering design, manufacturing, package testing and materials.

The scale of Shanghai's IC industry in 2019 exceeded 170 billion yuan ($24.44 billion), with 71.5 billion yuan in design, 38.9 billion yuan in manufacturing, 38.2 billion yuan in package testing and 21.8 billion yuan in materials, according to data from the Shanghai Integrated Circuit Industry Association.

Shanghai also boasts many leading companies in the industry, including Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation and Shanghai Micro Electronics Equipment (Group) Co Ltd.

Despite challenges in diverse fields from January to May this year, Shanghai's integrated circuit industry continued to grow against the downward trend, with sales revenue increasing 38.7 percent.

Beijing, with its comprehensive strengths in scientific research, planned to establish an IC technological innovation base with international influence by 2020.

Shenzhen planned to build an integrated circuit industrial cluster with international competitiveness by 2023, with an industrial scale reaching 200 billion yuan.

Sales of China's integrated circuit industry reached 756.23 billion yuan in 2019, up 15.8 percent year-on-year, although the global semiconductor market declined 12.1 percent year-on-year last year, according to data from China Semiconductor Industry Association.