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Suzhou becomes a hot spot for Japanese, Korean enterprises

Suzhou Bureau of Commerce | Updated:2021-10-12 17:04


A bird's eye view of Suzhou Industrial Park. [Photo/China Daily]

The prefecture-level city of Suzhou – located in East China's Jiangsu province – has reportedly become a hot spot for Japanese and Korean enterprises, which are increasingly basing themselves there due to its attractive economic, cultural and living environment. 

Statistics show that Japan and South Korea have respectively become the city's third and the sixth biggest source of foreign investment. There are 2,909 Japanese-funded enterprises and 2,357 South Korean-backed companies based in Suzhou now, respectively accounting for 44.5 percent and 40 percent of Jiangsu province's total. 

The city's use of Japanese investment funding has cumulatively reached an estimated $13.74 billion and that from South Korea has risen to $5.3 billion, accounting for 11.3 percent and 6.2 percent, respectively, of the country's total respectively. 

A total of 57 Japanese and South Korean Fortune 500 companies – including Toyota, Panasonic, Samsung and POSCO – have invested in 193 projects in Suzhou over the past four decades. 

In 2019, the city's Japanese-funded and South Korean-funded enterprises generated revenue of 355.59 billion yuan ($55.14 billion) and paid taxes of 16.3 billion yuan. 

In Suzhou New District alone – a national high-tech zone – there are more than 600 Japan-invested companies located there, making the precinct the most concentrated area for Japanese investment in the city. What's more, the Japanese groups have also established the Japanese Society of Commerce and Industry and the province's only Japanese school there. 

When making their decision to move there, the enterprises reportedly carefully considered the city's particularly attractive investment incentives and policies, its favorable business environment, as well as supportive services for foreign investors. 

The case of Swany China – the province's first Sino-foreign joint venture located in Kunshan, a county-level city under the administration of Suzhou – is considered a great example. To help the venture deal with all the formalities and settle down there, local investment liaison officials went to Beijing and Nanjing for consultations over 100 times. That initiative has reportedly given Japanese and South Korean enterprises much more confidence in doing business in Suzhou. 

Suzhou Industrial Park and Suzhou New District were listed among the first batch of seven China-Japan-South Korea industrial cooperation demonstration zones in the province this February. That was seen as another significant step for the city, since the inauguration last September of a Sino-Japanese regional development and cooperation demonstration zone in its Xiangcheng district. 

Apart from being a magnet for attracting investment, Suzhou Industrial Park has also sought business expansion in Japan and South Korea. Earlier this year, it established an international business cooperation center in Tokyo. 

Due to its abundant Japanese and South Korean investment resources, the Jiangsu Provincial Government chose Suzhou to be the venue for the Taihu East Asian Entrepreneurs Forum which was held in May. The event was reportedly attended by many leaders and senior executives of Fortune 500 companies – among them, Tetsuro Homma, executive vice president of Panasonic Corp. 

Meanwhile, cultural and living environment has also proved to be a significant factor in drawing in investment. Suzhou's Huaihai Street – established in 1994 and renovated and reopened for business in 2020 – is a Japanese-style commercial street familiar to locals, which has proved to be particularly popular with Japanese people residing in the city. 

At the opening ceremony of the renovated street, a five-meter-tall mechanical moving Japanese crested ibis – symbolizing China-Japan friendship – was inaugurated. The mechanical bird, which has become a draw for tourists, is also said to symbolize the bright future for cooperation between Suzhou and Japanese and South Korean enterprises. 

The Japanese crested ibis is a sacred bird in Japan. It was almost extinct in 1980s, but numbers subsequently increased to current levels of about 2,000, helped by China-Japan cooperation. 

Elsewhere, the Hanshan Temple, three kilometers away from Huaihai Street, is said to be a sacred cultural place for Japanese people. Many Japanese celebrities have visited the temple on the eve of the Spring Festival over the past three decades. 

The poem Mooring by Maple Bridge at Night written by Zhang Ji, a poet in Tang Dynasty (618-907) at Hanshan Temple, is regarded as a cultural symbol for Sino-Japanese exchanges. 

The combination of all these factors has reportedly made Suzhou city a compelling proposition for Japanese and South Korean companies considering investment in China.