City of Innovation and Entrepreneurship

Private Businesses’ Way to Innovation

China’s auto market has long been dominated by foreign brand vehicles. But now it has entered a new development stage, with huge changes occurring in consumer demographics together with their demands.

Peter Horbury, Volvo’s former head designer, incorporated the relevant Volvo technologies into his design of the flagship Geely Borui model.

People have an increasing appetite for individualized products that feature high technology and a reasonable price-performance ratio. Liu Wen, a trainer with Geely Automobile Research Institute, told China Today: “Relying on its advantages in scientific research and development and technology innovation, Geely has made strategic adjustments to launch new brands such as Emgrand and Borui, not only occupying shares in the domestic market, but also winning overseas consumers.”

Now, with 13,000-odd patent applications and some 6,500 granted patents, among which over 2,300 applications are for inventions, 900 granted, Geely has been listed among the “Top 10 Brands of Independent Intellectual Property Innovation of Chinese Enterprises.”

In April 2016, Geely kicked off the new energy vehicle project in Hangzhou, with a planned investment of RMB 8 billion, the largest industrial investment project of the year in the city. A Geely spokesman said that this time the company decided to keep Hangzhou as the project location because of the city’s benign entrepreneurship and innovation environment and great efforts to upgrade its economic structure.

In fact, the expansion of private businesses in Hangzhou is to a large extent driven by their capability of bringing in foreign cutting-edge technology and independent innovation.

Among the Top 500 Private Enterprises in 2015 unveiled by the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, 55 are in Hangzhou, ranking the city No.1 for the past consecutive 13 years in both the country and Zhejiang Province in terms of the number of enterprises on the list. Many private business giants such as Geely and Wahaha Group have all established their headquarters in Hangzhou.

The famous Chinese beverage producer Hangzhou Wahaha Group has blazed a trail with the introduction of new technologies and innovations. In the face of keen competition in the domestic market, Wahaha adheres to the “spirit of craftsmanship” and constantly adopts new technologies to produce individualized products and soft drinks with more taste, so as to better meet various consumers demands. In 2016 alone, Wahaha created a series of new brands such as Maoyuan coffee and Qili function drinks.