The Dongguan Association of Enterprises with Foreign Investment recently released the "Annual Analysis Report on the Business Status of Member Enterprises in 2018" (hereafter the Report). According to a survey of 376 member companies, more than 90% of respondents are confident about, and willing to continue, their continuous development in Dongguan. Domestic sales revenue and R&D investment of foreign companies surveyed have seen a year-on-year increase. 

The 376 member companies surveyed in the Report are mainly engaged in industries such as electronics, electrical appliances, textiles, clothing, metal parts, plastic processing, machinery, and moulding. Investments in Dongguan began from 1979 to 2018, with an average time of 17 years. The respondents' sales revenue in 2018 totalled 130.4 billion RMB.

56.12% of respondent companies have already started domestic sales while 19.68% are engaged only in exports. In 2018, the domestic sales revenue of respondents accounted for an average of 42.19% of their total sales revenue, and the average domestic sales revenue amounted to 152.92 million RMB. It has shown an increasing trend over the past three years.

In terms of new investment intentions for this year, 84.04% of the respondents remain unchanged, and 3.58% plan to increase investment or expand production in the near future. 57.45% of respondents have land requirements, of which 31.60% hope that there will be "green channel" for renting and renewing the collective industrial plants of the village; 22.48% hope that the floor area ratio of industrial land or storage land will be increased, while 13.03% hope that the government can help solve historic land problems.

The companies surveyed are full of confidence for their continuous development in Dongguan, with more than 90% willing to continue to develop in Dongguan. 26.60% of the enterprises have established R&D institutions, the earliest back in 1988. It's been 7 years on average since the establishment of R&D institutions in these enterprises with a total investment of more than 2.5 billion RMB.

The data shows that 30.77% of the surveyed companies have already, or plan to, established R&D institutions in electronic appliances, 11.54% in the mechanical moulds industry, and 10.58% in the textiles and clothing industry. 86% of enterprises that have established R&D institutions have done so in Dongguan.

The surveyed enterprises have on average invested in Dongguan for 17 years, and more than 90% of respondents were Hong Kong-funded enterprises. This means that the first generation of Hong Kong businessmen who came to Dongguan to develop are mostly middle or old-aged. In order to ensure the sustainable and long-term development of these enterprises in Dongguan, the Report pointed out that the second generation needs to do as good a job as the first.

(By Stefanie Tan and Sev Pischl)