Xiangtan would be a little-known city in Hunan province, but for one thing - the nearby township of Shaoshan was the birthplace of Mao Zedong. Consquently, Shaoshan is one of the most popular tourist destinations in China. Every year it attracts millions of visitors, all of them keen to see for themselves the hometown of one of the most significant figures in China's long history.

The city, though, is not happy to rely solely on its historic associations. Jiuhua, a small town in the northern suburbs of the city, is now at the forefront of building Xiangtan's reputation among the global business community.

Following its establishment as an economic development zone some five years ago, Jiuhua has grown into a major industrial center. The zone is now home to some of China's - and the world's - most well-known companies, including Taiwan-based United Microelectronics, Samsung from South Korea, General Electric from the United States, Siemens from Germany, as well as three domestic companies, Minmetal, Geely and China Metallurgy.

Today more than 130 industrial businesses are based in the Jiuhua zone, the result of a combined investment of some 40 billion yuan.

Many of the businesses identified high levels of local government support as one of their key reasons for relocating to Jiuhua.

Hu Bianjiang, president of the Hunan Geely Auto Parts Co Ltd, said: "During the process of negotiating for support in starting up a business here, we were deeply impressed both with the professionalism of the local authorities and with the services they provided. These are clearly on a par with the services offered by China's more developed eastern coastal areas."

Headquartered in Zhejiang province, Geely is well-known as the first independent automotive manufacturer in China. The Hunan Geely Co in Jiuhua is now the company's fifth car production facility in the country.

On November 2, 2005, Geely Holdings Group signed an agreement with the Xiangtan city government to formally launch its Jiuhua production plant. To ensure the launch was efficiently managed, the administration committee designated a special taskforce to oversee the process, allowing for tailored solutions to be provided for all of Geely's needs.

Due largely to the work of this taskforce, the design and construction of the facility were all completed within a year, allowing it to swiftly go into operation. A spokesman for Geely described the speed of the process as "unexpected".

Initial work on the facility began on January 20, 2006, with the first Geely Kingkong car rolling off the assembly line on December 25, 2006, just over 11 months later. The second phase of the project commenced in 2008.

Geely is not the only company to comment on the excellent levels of local government support in Jiuhua, with a number of newcomers also endorsing the management committee's hard work.

A senior manager at the Xiangtan Aiming Digital Electronics Co Ltd, a recent addition to the growing number of businesses working out of Jiuhua, said: "The support of the local authorities always exceeded our expectations."

One-stop shop

In April 2008, a one-stop service center was established in the development zone. This gives prospective businesses the opportunity to handle all of their start-up paperwork, including business registration, approval applications and taxation details, under one roof. As a further boost to efficiency, prospective businesses are each assigned their own account manager who will oversee the whole process.

All of the account managers have been trained in every aspect of the application process, including the ability to evaluate all of the relevant start-up documents and business blueprints. Using their expertise, Jiuhua now aims to offer approval for construction projects within 13 working days.

As well as their efficiency, the Jiuhua team prides itself on being able to offer considerable cost savings to prospective businesses. One senior manager at Quanchuang Technologies (Xiangtan) Co Ltd estimated that the work of the team had saved his company around 30 percent on their initial estimated construction costs.

He said: "The biggest problem in construction approval is that we cannot always put forward a complete set of documents and blueprints. In some other regions this would result in the application being rejected. However, in Jiuhua, the application procedure can be handled step by step, ensuring that construction work will not be delayed."

Founded in November 6, 2003, the Jiuhua Economic Development Zone is located in the northern suburbs of Xiangtan. It is five km from the center of Xiangtan and 27 km from the center of Changsha, the capital of Hunan province.

The developed area of the zone is now 13 sq km. It is anticipated that the eventual size of the site will be around 138 sq km.

In 2008, the zone's total industrial output value was 3.25 billion yuan. The figure is expected to reach 100 billion yuan by 2015, as more and more projects become operational.