## 4 Development Roadmap of the LC-RIS Industry in China  
The LC-RIS industry in China faces several challenges, e.g., low market share (due to insufficient awareness of LC's advantages), weak competitiveness (due to export control of high-end LC-device making instrument), small industry scale (only a few companies specialized in LC microwave have emerged in recent years), and dependence on imported high-end scientific instruments (as mentioned above). However, the potential for growth in the industry is enormous, and there is a vast scope for development.  
To address these challenges, it is essential to focus on key core issues and overcome relevant technical barriers. This can be achieved by promoting the localization of key core components and enhancing the technological capabilities of the industry. The government should play a crucial role in guiding the industry's development, while enterprises should take the lead in driving innovation and growth. To be more specific, both national and local scientific instrument companies (specializing in LC technology and microwave/THz techniques) should be encouraged to jointly play a vital role in the development of the LC-RIS industry by investing in research and development; fusing LC displays, LCOS, and LCRA with RIS; enhancing their technological capabilities; and expanding their market share in comparison to other rapidly growing RIS counterparts, such as multifunctional tunable metamirrors [37] and metasurfaces [38; 39].  
To achieve the goal of commercializing the LC-RIS industry in China, it is essential to adopt a targeted approach and provide appropriate support to different segments of the industry. This can be achieved by providing financial support to scientific instrument projects and promoting innovation and development. The industry should also focus on achieving industrialization and scaling up the application of scientific instruments. Finally, it is crucial to invest in the development of high-level scientific instrument talents (in LCOS, LCRA and RIS) to ensure the long-term growth and sustainability of the LC-RIS industry.  
With joint efforts, the establishment of a scientific innovation system that integrates industry, academia, research, and application, as well as the cultivation and development of a group of large-scale comprehensive LC-based microwave enterprises, China's LC-RISindustry can certainly achieve a transformation from the current \"following\" position to \"keeping pace\" with the future and eventually leading the field. This requires the collaboration of various stakeholders, including the government, industry, academia, and research institutions, to promote the development of LC-RIS and their applications. The cultivation of talent and the promotion of innovation are also crucial in this process. Through these efforts, China can enhance its competitiveness in the global LC-RIS market and contribute to the advancement of science and technology.  
Here, at the Beijing Key Laboratory of Millimeter Wave and Terahertz Technology, School of Integrated Circuits and Electronics, Beijing Institute of Technology (BIT), one of our over-arching goals is to bridge the gaps of LC-RIS in a few pressing applications facing our civilization. By combining the specialism of producing scalable, portable, and affordable LC tunable devices [20] with the well-established state of the art in large-scale phased antenna array, antenna miniaturization techniques [40], and metasurfaces [41; 42], we are developing in-house code and new experimental prototypes for producing quality-assured LC-RIS embedded with sensing capabilities [43], thereby paving the way for the implementation of digital twins of future LC-RIS-enabled post-5G [44; 45] and 6G systems, while delivering new knowledge of RIS science and education.