The appointment by China's rubber-stamp parliament comes after Xi locked in another five years as head of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in October.
The United States and China have been locked in a tech rivalry for years, with each country vying for dominance in key technology sectors such as artificial intelligence (AI), 5G, and semiconductors.
The nation of 1.4 billion has seen birth rates plunge to record lows as its workforce ages, in a rapid decline that analysts warn could stymie economic growth and pile pressure on strained public coffers.
The defence ministers of Russia, Turkey and Syria met in Moscow on Wednesday, the first such talks since a war broke out in Syria, the Russian defence ministry said.
The missile system started getting development around 2015 and the development of such a capability was given a push by the late Gen Bipin Rawat as Chief of Army Staff.
The United States on Thursday imposed sanctions on over a dozen companies based in China, Hong Kong and the United Arab Emirates that Washington accused of facilitating the sale of Iranian petrochemicals and petroleum products to buyers in East Asia.