Special Supplement: Hi-tech zone drives city's economic growth

Located in the southwestern suburbs of the ancient city, the Xi'an Hi-tech Industrial Development Zone has become one of the hot destinations for domestic and foreign investment.

Some 3,000 domestic and foreign IT companies, with a total employee strength of 346,000, have so far established operations in the zone -- one of the top 10 State-level hi-tech zones launched in early 1991.

Covering a 35-sq km area, the zone has seen rapid development in recent years, with the combined sales revenue of its registered companies increasing from about 48.1 billion yuan ($6.2 billion) in 2002 to more than 137.9 billion yuan ($17.7 billion) last year.

In the first half of this year, the zone's enterprises realized business revenues of up to 80.1 billion yuan ($10.3 billion), an increase of 33.6 percent year-on-year.

Also, the zone has received about 40.8 billion yuan ($5.2 billion) in fixed-asset investment from 2003 to 2006, during which it implemented the second phase of its development strategy.

Thanks to huge domestic and foreign investments, the zone has developed the four key industries of electronic information, equipment and manufacturing, biomedicine and new materials, becoming one of the important engines driving local economic and social growth.

Increasing investment over the last four years has helped the zone better readjust its industrial structure and form a number of competitive industrial clusters.

Recent years have also seen the establishment of a number of projects invested by some leading multinational companies, including the US-based Micron and Applied Materials.

In September 2005, Micron, the world's second largest EMS memory and chip provider, opened a chip model processing and testing center in the zone, with an investment of up to $250 million.

Applied Materials, the world's largest semiconductor equipment maker, opened a research and development (R&D) center in the zone in April last year, with an investment of $255 million.

The two American-invested projects began operation after they completed first phase construction in March this year.

Further, a number of top foreign companies, including the Japan-based Toshiba and Germany-based SEW, set up their research and development centers there early this year.

A number of domestic investors have also made a beeline for the zone. They include leading hi-tech enterprises like the Shenzhen-based Huawei Technologies Co Ltd, Shanghai Long Cheer Group and Nanjing-based Linkage Technology Co Ltd, which have set up production facilities or R&D centers there.

The zone has so far set up three coordinative offices in Beijing, Shanghai and the Silicon Valley in the United States, to promote its investment environment and attract both domestic and overseas capital.

Since 2003, the zone has received 55 billion yuan ($7.1 billion) in total investment, of which $735 million came from foreign companies.

Local officials attribute the increasing inflow of capital to the improved investment environment of Xi'an in recent years.

In the transportation sector, the city has opened its skies to more international flights, as well as started construction of the urban metro project and a number of ring roads.

In addition, the zone has launched three university science and technology parks, one State-level software industrial base and several IT start-up centers.

(Shanghai Start 09/07/2007 page4)