Innovation is known to be important for productivity and economic growth, while intellectual property rights are, in conventional economics models, thought to spur innovation. Yet China, which averaged over 6 percent annual economic growth for three decades and is often cited as a growth miracle, has been criticized for poor intellectual property rights protection domestically, as well as when exporting products abroad. In Africa, headlines have appeared denouncing cheap copies or fake products from China and their adverse impacts on local manufacturing and other outcomes. Today, the Chinese government and private sector actors feel strongly that China is a global centre of innovation. Has Chinas model of innovation been different to what conventional economic theory suggests? And could a similar model be relevant or appropriate in African and other developing countries?