When Motorola came to select site for their production several years ago, this American telecom giant listed cities they thought might provide good conditions for their success in China. Nobody had ever expected that the eventual choice was TEDA in North China. "Tianjin stood out," says E.L.Tay, Motorola Asia operations director,"It was the pro-activeness of local officials who convinced Motorola investment environment that all big companies look for. " When asked why they chose TEDA, the overseas investors would say that it was because of its administration, particularly the simplified procedures and high working efficiency have built up their reputation.

TEDA has attracted quite a few top transnational companies including Motorola, Coca-cola, Pepsico, and American Standard from USA, Nestle from Switzerland, BBA from UK, Lafarge, Alcatel from France, Buderus from Germany, Matsushita, Mitsubishi, Itochu from Japan, Samsung, Hyundai from Korea, President from Taiwan etc. Over 3000 overseas projects from 65 countries and regions including 29 companies of 99' Fortune top 500 have settled in TEDA.

General Manager of Tianjin Merlin Gerin, one of the earliest investors in TEDA, Mr. Tabary said, his company doesn't want to build the plants by itself, and he has spoken with TEDA and suggested TEDA to make the investment, in turn rent it to the miniature circuit breaker producer from France. Tabary said, TEDA is receptive to the suggestion. If TEDA approves this plan, the decision to open another factory in TEDA will be an easy one.

Mr. Tabary, who is also the representative of French Chamber of Commerce in Tianjin said," We have had a good experience in TEDA and what I hear from other people is that they are also getting a lot of help from TEDA when they want to do things here. This good reputation facilitate TEDA to continue to maintain speedy growth."

TEDA's GDP in 1999 reached 20.845 billion RMB, a year-on-year increase of 19.1% calculated in comparable prices. The total industrial output value reached 60.855 billion RMB, a 20% increase than the previous year. Though the Asian financial crisis resulted in a nationwide export drop in China, TEDA saw its exports rise 22.7% to 2.254 billion USD. Overseas investment in TEDA has accumulated to US$12.198 billion. In 1998, it drew in US$1.28 billion, about the same as the previous year. About half of it came from existing investors in TEDA. This shows the confidence these enterprises have in TEDA.

Thanks to the continued efforts of TEDA, the ratio of investors from USA, UK, Switzerland, Canada and other European countries began to rise in 1999. Moreover, TEDA also has attached great importance to investment from CIS countries, from Eastern Europe, Africa and Latin America and their markets. In 1999, products from TEDA were exported to 106 countries and regions; in the same year, the export to USA saw a 43.2% increase, totaled 709 million US$; the increase of export to Europe was 23.9% to 439 million US$.

TEDA is one of the areas in China with a highly developed transportation system. It takes just 1.5 hours from Beijing via the Beijing-Tianjin-Tanggu Expressway, and is connected to the national roads network by over a dozen main highways including the Shanhaiguan-Guangzhou Expressway and the Beijing-Fuzhou Expressway. TEDA is 20 minutes drive from the Tianjin New Harbor, the largest port in north China and the second largest container port in all of China. The annual handling capacity by 2000 is about 100 million tons. North China's largest airfreight center, the Tianjin International Airport, is only 38km from TEDA. The Beijing-Shanhaiguan railway is connected with the national railway network and the fast-developing Euro-Asian continental bridge will provide TEDA with a rail link to Europe.