More foreign firms set up in HK, but care urged
A record 6,440 overseas and mainland companies have offices in Hong Kong, a government survey released yesterday showed.
But even though Hong Kong remained an attractive city for foreign companies to open offices, InvestHK director general Mike Rowse warned against complacency.
Mr Rowse said the high cost of office space, the need to improve air quality and the lack of international school places posed key challenges to the city in attracting investment.
But he said these problems had been put to the government and 'work would be done'.
The government's survey showed that, as of June 1, overseas companies had 6,440 regional headquarters and local and regional offices in Hong Kong, 86 more than at the same time last year.
Regional headquarters manage offices in Asia, while regional offices are defined as co-ordinating regional operations, and local offices oversee business in Hong Kong. In the first half of the year, 45 firms opened regional headquarters and offices in the city, an increase of 1.2 per cent from last year.
Describing the result as 'modest', Mr Rowse said the number of local offices increased the most, up 1.6 per cent, or 41 offices, to 2,550.
There was an increase of 18 regional headquarters, or 1.5 per cent, to 1,246.
Mr Rowse said the increase in regional headquarters was not as substantial as last year despite Hong Kong attracting US$27.1 billion in direct foreign investment in the first six months of the year, a rise of about 30 per cent compared with last year.
He said overseas firms may only be expanding existing operations - rather than opening new offices - to handle the increase in transactions.
The Census and Statistics Department's latest annual survey of regional and local offices showed US companies had the highest number of regional headquarters with 298 and regional offices with 593, followed by Japan and Britain.
Mainland firms held on to the top spot for local offices with 480, while Japanese businesses had 431 and US companies 394.
The top reason overseas companies cited for locating their offices in the city remained unchanged - a low and simple tax system.
Around 66 per cent of the companies polled regarded the tax regime as a favourable factor for Hong Kong.
Other important factors were the free flow of information, absence of exchange controls, a corruption-free government and sound communication, transport and infrastructure networks.
The survey had a 98 per cent response rate among international and mainland firms.
