1. Sichuan’s imports and exports increased quickly in the first quarter
From January to March, the accumulated imports and exports of Sichuan province reached 4.06 billion US dollars, up 59.7% year-on-year, while 24.6% higher than the national average for the corresponding period, learned the journalist recently from the Chengdu Customs Office.

2. 150-million-yuan bill agreed, receiving transplantation of shoemaking industry from Guangdong province.
On April 16, at the seminar of Sichuan’s Reception of Transplantation of Shoemaking Industry of Guangzhou held in Guangzhou, “China Female Shoes Capital” Chongzhou Base concluded in total 7 projects of shoemaking and accessory industries, involving investment of 1.5 billion yuan, which made itself the industrial park signed with the most projects and largest investment.

3. China’s first specialized international talent market established in Chengdu
On April 17, the Chengdu Software Talent Market of China International Talent Market was officially established. It is reported that it is so far China’s first specialized international talent market approved by the State Foreign Experts Administration.

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There has been a lot of talk lately about where people will go should the China bubble burst, where to go when suppliers in China cannot be trusted, and more importantly where to go when congress slaps punitive tariffs on China…

Well.. it isn’t Vietnam. And here is why.

When this conversation occurs, it is typically started with”what if” and ususally will involve India and Vietnam in some manner. There are articles about Vietnam’s progress, blog posts about its future, and more talk.

The problem is, like India, it is missing the infrastructure…. specifically its logistics infrastructure.

When speaking about China’s economic miracle, it is clear that without modern ports that could cycle millions of TEUs, the trucks that were capable of handling the containers, the roads for the trucks to drive on, etc… China’s economic position in today’s world would have been much different… and with a background in logistics, one of the first things I do when looking at the potential suitability of a city is look at its logistics infrastructure.

However, as you can see in this presentation, Vietnam has a looong way to go.

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Following a couple weeks of break, I thought this would be an easy post to get me back into the saddle… here is the news as reported by my friend Jessica at the Foreign Investment Bureau

468 Project will roundly upgrade Chengdu’s informationization next year

In order to cooperate with the application of China’s first “ministry-province-city co-built interactive demonstration zone of informationization and information industrialization”, on August 26, Chengdu’s informationization office published the recent project construction plan: Chengdu is planning to gradually improve four basic systems which are “networking support”, “data resources”, “information security” and “application services”, start up 6 key informationization projects as well as 8 major application demonstration works, which are expected to be finished next year. It is revealed that the projects plan to absorb social capital and government direct investment of over RMB 1.2 billion, and will drive an estimated over RMB 100 billion indirect social investment.

It is reported that the construction of the projects will have huge upgrading effect over the whole city’s informationization construction. Meanwhile, world-class software R&D companies such as Microsoft, IMB and Oracle will become close partners of Chengdu’s information industrialization.

“Macrocosmic Chengdu” builds up four major industrial bases
At Chengdu’s 2007 mapping work meeting, the city’s planning conservancy revealed its thinking and basic idea about “Macrocosmic Chengdu” and the formulation of the planning is expected to be finished at the end of this year. According to the initial thought, Chengdu’s 12,390-km2 land will be shaped into a five-level urban structure including a metropolis, 14 new cities, 306 towns, about 600 villages and 3000 inhabited spots. Railroads and expressways will reach new cities, highways connect key towns and roads run through every village.

In respect of industrial layout, the city will be divided into four major bases which are high technology industrial base, modern machinery base, modern service base and modern agriculture base.

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More convenient business creation, Chengdu’s first zero-down-payment company successfully registered
On August 15, commercial bureau of Qingyang district ratified and issued the business license to the first company registered with zero down payments. Chengdu municipal commercial bureau recently has issued a series of policies to loose market entry and promote private companies: allowing companies (except one-man business) with registered capital less than RMB 5 million to register with zero down payment as long as its shareholders promise to fund 20% of the capital within three months and the rest in installments. The industrial and commercial section will issue to such companies firstly a business license with validation period of three months.

China’s first aerospace high technology industrial base was opened in Chengdu high-tech zone
China Aviation Industry Corporation I recently has reached an investment agreement with Chengdu municipal government to promote the industrial development of the country’s edge aerospace high technology in Chengdu. On August 18, China’s first aerospace high-tech industrial base was settled in Chengdu High-tech Zone, which marked the formal transition of China’s aerospace high technology from technical research to industrial development.

According to CAIC I, the base will be built according to world-class standard, which will be formed into an aerospace industrial cluster in Chengdu combining scientific research and manufacturing mainly for China’s top fighters, first-rate commercial planes and airborne equipments, develop international exchange and cooperation, and drive the local development of aviation, machine, electronics and information industry.

Yinhai and Hewlett-Packard co-set up solution center in Chengdu
It was announced days ago by HP China Limited and Sichuan Yinhai Software Company that they will jointly set up Yinhai – HP united solution center in Chengdu. It is reported that the center is the sister center of the ones HP has set in Beijing and Shanghai.

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It’s that time again, and for those of you who are looking to keep up with the news in Chengdu you will not be disappointed. There is a lot of investment going on.

EMC set up its 7th solution center with investment of RMB 50 million yuan
The world’s biggest IT storage company - EMC Corporation announced in May its collaboration with Sichuan Yinhai Software Co. Ltd to set up EMC China Solution Center (Chengdu), which is the seventh after the ones EMC established in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Hong Kong and Taipei in China. EMC have invested nearly RMB 50 million yuan in equipments to build up the center’s demo testing platform.

This center will bring in western regions of China the world’s leading information basic infrastructure demo, testing and application environment, and provide anti-disaster centers for clients’ key business data.

Israeli CTC Group to build a 40,000-square-meters’ mall in Chengdu
As is revealed, Israeli CTC Group through its Chinese subsidiary and its Hong Kong partner Lucky Hope will build a 40,000 square meters mall in Chengdu, with a total investment of 57 million euros. The mall will be built in the new municipal administration zone and its construction will take three years. The mall will comprise four buildings, three of which will be branches of IKEA, Decathlon, and Auchan, and the fourth a branch of a Chinese retail chain. The company already operates in Shenyang and Xian, and the Chengdu project is its first mall venture.

Chengdu’s patent application ranked second among deputy-provincial cities For the first half of this year, large-scale enterprises in Chengdu have realized an added industrial value of RMB 44.66 billion yuan, up 26.3%. From January to May, the increase of these companies’ added industrial value and business income from main trades both ranked second among 15 deputy-provincial cities in China.

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With the logistics marketing expanding on nearly every level, and many firms looking to build their networks, it should be no surprise that Volvo would view the China market as one filled with potential.

And so it should come as no surprise that Volvo has announced that they will expand their presence in China, and that expansion will start with a 25 city road tour to drum up sales.

With sales of 1,173 units last year (a 28% increase on 2005), Volvo is still only taking a fraction of the market away from heavy hitters FAW and Dongfeng. Of course, at twice the price of either of their competitors that should be expected.
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