Industrial clusters take shape in Shanghai FTZ

A high-tech enterprise in the China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone produces core CPU production line. [Photo/xinmin.cn]

A new batch of ten financial leasing enterprises recently settled in the bonded area of the China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone (FTZ), which focuses on projects in emerging industries. 

Projects in traditional fields such as airplanes, ships and mechanical equipment play a supplementary role.

Ten leading enterprises of the financial leasing industry signed a memorandum of cooperation with the administration bureau of the bonded area, showing considerable assets intention and benefit expectations. 

According to preliminary estimates by key enterprises, more than 100 aircraft, 100 ships and 10 billion yuan ($1.45 billion) of high-end equipment will be invested in the next three years.  The investment assets of the subsidiaries will see an average annual growth rate of over 20 percent. Some of the enterprises will strive to double the investment amount within two years. 

The projects cover the high-end equipment in the upstream and downstream of the industrial chain, including aircraft-related materials, energy security supply, integrated circuits, energy conservation and environmental protection, smart city brains and Belt and Road nuclear energy facilities, which reflects that the financial leasing industry has helped serve the real economy and promoted industrial transformation and upgrading.

"The traditional equipment in the energy field is mainly electric and thermal power, and the asset scale is about 10 trillion yuan. However, as the market demand for clean energy increases, new technologies such as wind power and photovoltaic power are being introduced. There will be a huge market for financial leasing during the process of new and old kinetic energy conversion," said Cai Ning, general manager of CPI Ronghe Financial Leasing Co.

The company has launched its high-end energy equipment rental business in the bonded area. 

"Serving the real economy has become the driving force for the sustainable development of the financial leasing industry, which is already evident in the bonded area that has gathered one-fifth of the country's financial leasing enterprises," he said, "Shanghai can be said to be at the forefront." 

With the help of institutional innovation and the expansion of openness, the free trade zone is accelerating the conversion of new and old kinetic energy. The transformation of traditional industries continues to be upgraded. 

Emerging industries such as biomedicine and artificial intelligence are becoming more prosperous. The entire region keeps releasing its economic radiation effect.

Financial leasing has become a major source for economic growth in the bonded area. By the end of last year, a total of 1,874 financial leasing enterprises had been established in the area, with the total scale of leasing assets reaching 1020.68 billion yuan. 

It has become one of the important clusters for China's financial leasing industry, and has effectively supported the development of the real economy in Shanghai and even in the Yangtze River Delta region. 

In addition to aircraft, aircraft engines, ships and traditional construction machinery and equipment, the financial leasing industry in the Shanghai FTZ has begun to extend its reach to new energy, new energy vehicles, massive medical and health care, high-end equipment manufacturing and other fields, with the scale of assets leading the country.