"Beijing is one of the homes for software businesses in the world which attract more software companies. The government will pay more attention to the software industry from 2005 and aim to make Beijing a 'hub of software' in the world," Fan Boyuan, Deputy Mayor of the capital city told his audience at a forum in the International Hi-tech Expo which concluded last Friday.

The 2300 registered software businesses in Beijing spent some 9.6 billion yuan on research and development in 2004, which led to 1238 new products recognized by the government.

Fan also cited the software industry generated 52 billion yuan revenue for Beijing in 2004. That is a year-on-year rise of 35 percent and accounts for 34 percent of the total revenue of the software industry in the whole country.

The city's software exports valued 227 million USD last year, surging 65 percent over the previous year.

By People's Daily Online