As the global economy suffers its biggest swoon in decades, many US and European companies are battling to simply survive.

But some of China's biggest technology giants seem to be taking the pandemic in their stride, unveiling ambitious expansion plans in the face of what many fear will be a deep global recession.

This week, Alibaba, the Chinese e-commerce firm, announced plans to pump $29bn (£23.5bn) – half of its 2019 revenues – into an expansion of its cloud computing division. ByteDance, the owner of popular video sharing app TikTok, is set to hire 10,000 new workers globally as businesses elsewhere furlough staff.

Other Chinese entrepreneurs are sizing up opportunities in start-ups outside the country, such as a recent – albeit failed – effort to re-domicile Britain's Imagination Technologies to China.

Despite the impact of Covid-19 first being felt in the country following an initial outbreak in Wuhan, China’s tech giants that are on the march, emerging from a tumultuous few months with more hunger than ever to grow.

Meanwhile, authorities in Beijing are pushing hard for a radical reform of global internet standards in a move that could cement Chinese authority over cyberspace for years to come – and all as world powers focus their efforts on fighting the virus.

To some, the raw hunger of China's technology giants to grow comes as no surprise.