A few days ago, Kraft Heinz Group, one of the world's largest food and beverage companies, became the first multinational headquarters in Asia in Hongkou. In the past two years, in addition to Kraft Heinz, the multinational group giants settling down in Hongkou included US Bose Group (the world famous audio brand manufacturer), Electrolux (the world's leading household appliance brand), Defu Fund (the world's leading asset management company) under Deutsche Bank, and Mitsui O.S.K. Lines, Ltd. (the world's top 500 supply chain leader).
It was learned from the District Commerce Committee that Hongkou has thoroughly studied and implemented the spirit of the 20th CPC National Congress, closely focused on the construction goal of the North Bund of Shanghai and the Golden Triangle of Huangpu River, focused on the key points, and promoted the development of foreign capital headquarters economy to a higher quality. This year, 22 kinds of high headquarters will be added.
Paying Close Attention to the Business Environment
In recent years, Hongkou has vigorously promoted the implementation of international organization projects. In September this year, the Shanghai Investment Promotion Center of the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) successfully settled at the North Bund of Hongkou. The organization will rely on the exchange and cooperation platform and high-quality project resources to promote deeper cooperation in areas such as innovative development and economic transformation, and help achieve high quality and sustainable economic development in Hongkou. At the same time, UNIDO will launch various international investment promotion activities in Hongkou to further build an international and professional brand image of Hongkou's foreign investment work.
In daily work, Hongkou closely contacts high-level institutions and platforms. Since this year, with the support of the Shanghai Council for the Promotion of International Trade, the Shanghai Investment Promotion Center, the UNIDO and other institutions, Hongkou has held 10 foreign investment promotion activities, including the China Japan Round Table, the Double Carbon Dialogue Round Table, the Foreign Investment Promotion Agency's Visit to Hongkou, and the Symposium on Key Foreign-funded Enterprises, online and offline, to give full play to the advantages of market resources and promote the interconnection of policy initiatives, market channels, investment projects and other information.
Before the CIIE this year, the Hongkou District Commerce Committee planned in advance to encourage domestic and foreign enterprises to actively participate in the CIIE through visits and contacts, and integrate into the new development pattern of domestic and international double cycle. Under the strong promotion of foreign capital services, the regional headquarters of multinational companies such as PIL, MSC, Kose China, Angliss, as well as a number of foreign funded enterprises in Hongkou such as Panasonic, BMW China, and SynthAsia, set up exhibitions at the CIIE. The business sector held a theme day activity for promoting foreign business environment at the North Bund Pavilion of the CIIE, building a strong magnetic field for foreign promotion.
The Hongkou also took various measures to further promote the full coverage and internal circulation of foreign enterprises. In order to better serve foreign-funded enterprises, the department has established a WeChat group of foreign-funded enterprises in the district according to the industry category, providing an instant platform for daily business exchanges between enterprises, resource sharing, application of policies to government departments, feedback needs, etc. In combination with the grand survey and the grand troubleshooting, we conducted in-depth research and troubleshooting in foreign-funded enterprises inside and outside the district, visited key foreign-funded enterprises for face-to-face communication, and solved the urgent problems of enterprises in a timely manner.
Encouraging Headquarters Project with Real Gold and Silver
This year, the Hongkou District Commission of Commerce, according to relevant policies at the city level, actively formulated district-level policies for regional headquarters and R&D centers of transnational corporations upon study, and enhanced the willingness and confidence of headquarters enterprises to upgrade to regional headquarters of transnational corporations with the actual needs of enterprises as the guidance. The enterprises identified as regional headquarters of district level transnational corporations and foreign-funded R&D centers will be rewarded with RMB 1 million and RMB 500,000, respectively, demonstrating the determination and action of Hongkou District to support the capacity increase and the agglomeration of foreign-funded headquarters.
In order to help enterprises shorten the application process, the department of the Hongkou District Commission of Commerce continued to do a good job in refined service and precise guidance by innovatively setting up a special window in the "Handling-All-Online" Hongkou Channel and producing a graphic operation guide. Through making acceptance conditions, application materials, handling procedures and other contents clear at a glance, it further promoted the digital service, so that enterprises could run less, handle easily and be more efficient.