New map released to guide foreign investment dollars

Shanghai on Nov 7 released a map outlining the characteristics and resources of its 16 districts so as to give investors a better understanding of the city's existing industries.

"We hope that the Shanghai Industrial Map will help investors from different sectors find ideal projects more effectively," said Chen Mingbo, chairman of Shanghai Municipal Commission of Economy and Informatization. "This will in turn speed up the development of the relevant industrial chains and innovation systems, and ultimately promote economic development in the city."

To date, Shanghai is home to more than 50,000 foreign companies, 653 regional headquarters of multinational corporations, and 438 foreign-invested R&D centers, according to Chen.

Viewed as the birthplace of China's modern industry, Shanghai has all the resources to develop its modern manufacturing, and the 100 new measures pertaining to the further opening-up announced earlier this year by the municipal government offer policy support in building a higher quality and more efficient modern economic system, according to Wu Qing, vice mayor of Shanghai.

Shanghai saw its GDP grow 6.9 percent to 3.01 trillion yuan ($431 billion) in 2017, 3.78 percent of which was spent on research and development.

According to official statistics, industrial investment in Shanghai soared 18.5 percent to 76.23 billion yuan in the first nine months this year.

In addition, major industrial projects were announced from January to October, including electric vehicle maker Tesla's wholly-owned Gigafactory that has a projected annual capacity of 500,000 vehicles, a new 17-billion-yuan energy vehicle plant by SAIC Volkswagen, and Siemens' 3-billion-yuan manufacturing site for imaging and laboratory diagnostics products.

Tao Lin, vice-president of strategic development of Tesla Asia-Pacific, said that Shanghai's existing fleet of 200,000 new energy vehicles and the city's well-developed industrial chain for the automotive industry are attractive to market players like Tesla. She also pointed out that the US electric carmaker is determined to build an industrial automobile industrial cluster together with Shanghai.

The latest influx of foreign investment to the city came at the recently concluded China International Import Expo where companies in the healthcare, intelligent manufacturing, connected vehicles, and research and development sector inked agreements to undertake 10 projects worth 3.78 billion yuan in the city.