Hong Kong Government body InvestHK has helped 260 companies from 32 economies gain a business foothold in the city.
Among those businesses InvestHK assisted were restaurant chains, retailers and eCommerce businesses, including Munchies cafe , Birkenstock and HUAS Group.
While Mainland China was the largest source with a total of 52 companies, the US was close behind with 36, then followed the UK (26), Japan (20) and France (16). Other economies to make the top 10 origins list included Switzerland, Canada and Taiwan.
InvestHK says the companies planned to employ 2624 people – 1100 more than companies InvestHK assisted the year before.
In terms of start-ups, InvestHK assisted 54 founders and entrepreneurs to set up businesses in Hong Kong for the first six months of 2015, compared to 39 start-ups over a year ago. The start-ups assisted by InvestHK during the period came mainly from the US, France and the UK and included those working in ‘the Internet of things’ and financial technology industries.
Director-general of investment promotion at InvestHK, Dr Simon Galpin, said the interim figures, represent a 17 per cent rise compared to those for the same period last year.
“It is encouraging to see that the number of companies assisted by InvestHK continues to rise and that these Mainland and overseas companies are creating a growing number of new jobs in Hong Kong. As Asia continues to be a magnet for multinationals as well as individual founders and entrepreneurs, we are confident that we will be able to meet our annual target of assisting 370 companies this year,” Galpin said.
“As Hong Kong is reinforcing its role as the ‘super-connector’ between Mainland China and the rest of the world, Mainland companies will continue to use Hong Kong to ‘go global’ while overseas companies will use Hong Kong to manage their global activities.”
He noted that Hong Kong’s start-up ecosystem continues to develop with an increasing number of co-work spaces and a range of accelerators helping founders to launch their businesses globally from Hong Kong.