Bogota seeks for more investors in China and Japan

BOGOTA, Colombia, Oct. 16, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Bogota, through its foreign investment promotion agency Invest in Bogota, started this week a tour in China and Japan with the main objective of attracting more companies interested in developing business in the Colombian capital.

"The city must be involved in global value chains and use advantages such as its geographical position in Latin America to be a bridge between the region and the Asian market," said Juan Gabriel Perez, Executive Director of Invest in Bogota, who leads the mission that includes meetings with companies from the technology, chemical industry and infrastructure sectors, as well as Asian investment funds.

This mission, organized jointly with ProColombia, the entity responsible for promoting tourism, foreign investment and exports of the country, includes visits to the cities of Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Foshan and Beijing in China, in addition to Tokyo in Japan.

"China and Japan are two priority markets within the city's foreign investment promotion strategy," added Perez, who revealed that, in the last five years, the Colombian capital welcomed more than 60% of the country´s total investment received from China and Japan.

According to estimates from Invest in Bogota's Research and Market Intelligence area, from 2014 to 2018, more than 20 new investment or expansion projects have arrived in the city from these two destinations with an amount exceeding 400 million dollars. These investments resulted in the creation of more than 1,400 direct jobs for the city.

In the case of China, investments sum up to almost 170 million dollars, generating about 600 jobs. Among those Chinese investments we have the mobility platform DiDi, the retail store Miniso, and the medical devices company Mindray Medical.

Investments with Chinese origin that arrived in the city in the last 5 years were mailing from the automotive, telecommunications and information technologies sectors.

Japanese investments, which were mainly concentrated in the automotive industry, manufacturing and retail, totaled about 220 million dollars, with more than 900 jobs generated.

In 2016, the Japanese firm Castem, which specializes in the manufacture of parts for the automotive sector, opened a plant in the free trade zone of Intexzona in western Bogota, while the clothing and sporting goods firm Asics increased its presence in Latin America through a subsidiary in Bogota that opened in 2018.

SOURCE Invest in Bogotá