Shanghai unveils new programs to support overseas talent

Ti Gong

Shanghai unveiled several programs at the 3rd Shanghai Talent+ Summit, which kicked off on Wednesday, to enhance support for overseas talent to do innovations and business in the city.

At the opening ceremony of the four-day summit, the city government and the Ministry of Education signed an agreement to build a service demonstration zone for returning overseas talent.

The city also launched a scheme to recognize job qualification certificates issued overseas and a special service plan for outstanding global talent.

Also at the ceremony, winners of the third "Shanghai Talent" Global Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition were honored.

The competition attracted 8,118 entrepreneurial teams from all over world with intentioned investments of more than 5 billion yuan (US$685 million). More than 200 teams wanted to open their companies in Shanghai.

"Shanghai was a natural choice for me to start my company as it has the best environment, such as its complete supply chain," Hu Yilin, founder of the NASDAQ-listed urban mobility solution provider Xiaoniu Network Technology (Shanghai) Co.

"I can find upstream and downstream partners very quickly in Shanghai and in the Yangtze River Delta region. For example, if I need some parts, I only have to make a phone call and the supplier will deliver them to me in a few hours."

Though he founded Xiaoniu in 2014, Hu still took part in the third "Shanghai Talent" Global Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition held between last September and April this year.

"I think innovation should never stop. We want to learn the latest innovations and trends from other entrepreneurs," he suggested. "And it's worthy. During the competition, I reached cooperation agreements with three other competitors."

Other entrepreneurs also spoke highly of the environment in Shanghai for innovation and starting business.

Alex Zhavoronkov, founder and co-CEO of Insilico Medicine, a multinational biotechnology company that was set up in the China (Shanghai) Free Trade Zone in June 2019, told Shanghai Daily: "If you want to use software to discover novel therapeutics, the best place to be located is actually China because over the past 25 years, the government has spent maybe US$ 0.5-1 trillion on multiple types of biomedical infrastructure and also enabling infrastructure related to biomedical infrastructure.

"So it is an extremely, operationally efficient and ultra-high quality industry which allows you to rent lab space and even rent scientists who will perform the laboratory experiments. It's not the cheapest, but the level of quality that China has achieved is just next level. Also, the level of speed at which you can synthesize and test the chemistry is also much higher than you get anywhere else."