Abstract: The origin, formation and evolution of the systems engineering theory accompanied QIAN Xuesen’s whole life. The systems engineering theory is the concentrated reflection of QIAN’s achievements and theory in all aspects. From returning to China to pioneer China’s space industry, creating a new management mode of “one overall design department, two command lines”, publishing Organization and Management Technology: Systems Engineering, to proposing the theory of Open Complex Giant System (OCGS) and the theory of Metasynthetic Wisdom, all these mark the formation of the Chinese school of systems engineering. Guided by QIAN’s academic ideas, various major Chinese space programs have been implemented successfully which verified the fact that the systems engineering is scientific. The systems engineering has been applied to different fields of the national economy and has a development process with the distinguished characteristics of Chinese systems science. On one hand, the systems engineering is put forward deeply along the traditional systems engineering thought and theory; on the other hand, a batch of innovations that break the traditional shackles have occurred, making the Chinese systems engineering unique and outstanding compared with foreign counterparts .

Key words: Systems engineering, China’s space industry, Systematics, Comprehensive promotion