On October 20, the roundtable for promoting the development of foreign-funded enterprises in Hongkou was held at Taiping Shipping Building on the North Bund. Representatives of multinational enterprises within the district got together to seek high-quality development and talk about a better future. District Party Chief Li Qian attended the meeting and delivered a speech.
Li Qian said that Hongkou's unwavering determination to open up to the outside world at a high level would remain unchanged, and its unwavering determination to share development opportunities would remain unchanged. In the new journey of the Chinese path to modernization, foreign-funded enterprises would have great prospects. In the critical period of high-quality development in Hongkou, foreign-funded enterprises would have unlimited opportunities. Hongkou was born out of the water and thrives towards the water, with a deep gene for opening up to the outside world. Currently, it was actively promoting the development and construction of the North Bund, forming a development trend of the continuous aggregation of high-energy headquarters and high-level trade.
Hongkou would always uphold the concept of openness, cooperation, unity, and win-win situations, with the greatest sincerity, effort, and best services, strengthen consensus and make mutual empowerment around the construction of a flexible talent service system, the construction of information exchange platforms, and the creation of diverse talent living spaces. With high passion, practical measures, and greater efforts, Hongkou would become a government partner of enterprises. In comprehensively strengthening cooperation and exchange, it would provide significant impetus for the high-quality development of foreign-funded enterprises in Hongkou.
At the meeting, Deloitte interpreted China's macroeconomic trends and the "Report on the Development of Foreign Investment Competitiveness in Hongkou District". Representatives from PIL, Shui On Land, Aegon, BOSE, Viking Cruises, the Romanian Federation of Commerce and Industry in China, and SynthAsia, engaged in interactive exchanges around the investment environment of foreign enterprises.
Why choose Hongkou? In the eyes of foreign-funded enterprises, Hongkou is located at the North Bund of Shanghai and the Golden Triangle of the Huangpu River, with high-end resource elements such as shipping and finance. Especially in the context of the new round of development and construction of the North Bund, everyone is optimistic about the development prospects of the North Bund, Hongkou, and Shanghai. Bose Corporation (US), founded in 1954, just settled in Hongkou last month. It is an audio-visual technology company. Xu Linsen, Vice Sales President of BOSE Asia Pacific, said that the 2024 New Product Debut just held by the company on the North Bund received global attention and it was very successful. He was optimistic about the growth of the BOSE business in China, and he also looked forward to further strengthening their efforts in Hongkou.
“Being on the North Bund, we can timely keep up with foreign economic and trade policies of Shanghai and China. The annual CIIE (China International Import Expo) is a very important event for us. With the support of the Hongkou District Government, more than 20 enterprises will participate this year, and we look forward to more cooperation with Hongkou for further cooperation", said Robert Mitrofan, the chief representative of the Romanian Federation of Industry and Commerce in China.
Shui On Land, which cooperated with Hongkou since 1996, is an old friend of Hongkou. Wang Ying, Executive Director and CEO of Shui On Land, expressed her expectations at the meeting: "We hope that Hongkou can create a more sustainable industrial ecosystem, build a more complete innovation industry system, gather technology innovation enterprises, integrate into the development and construction of the North Bund with a more international perspective and advanced concepts, create a highly-dynamic 24-hour urban area, and further demonstrate the regional competitiveness”.
In recent years, Hongkou has been actively serving and integrating into the "14th Five-year Plan" period, during which Shanghai accelerated the development positioning of building a central node of domestic circulation and a strategic link of domestic and international dual circulation, and continuously and vigorously promote the high-quality development of an open economy. From January to July this year, the actual foreign investment increased by 22.9% year-on-year. The continuous growth of foreign investment highlighted the strong resilience and potential of Hongkou's external economy, and it was also the result of a series of policy advancements such as promoting opening up and continuously optimizing the business environment.