Atlanta welcomes Asian groups seeking business

About 400 global business leaders, governmental officials, community leaders, scholars and students gathered in Atlanta on Friday to pursue business opportunities between the US and Asia.

Inaugurated in 2011, the Symposium on ASIA-USA Partnership Opportunities (SAUPO) is one of the major Asia business conference in the US.

"We want to it to be the ‘Boao Forum' for the US," said SAUPO chairman and founder May Gao. "We strive to present SAUPO as an effective global platform for people-to-people and business to business dialogue … if we work together, build relationships, then we can create more opportunities for each other, and protect the peaceful environment in the world."

Boao Forum for Asia (BFA) has become a platform for dialogues among leaders from different economies as well as business and academic circles in Asia and other continents.

One of SAUPO's major goals is to provide opportunities for information exchange, network building, global visibility and investment to or from Asia, especially China, according to Gao.

Mike Burkenbine, CEO of Becket Film Fund, said Georgia has become the second-largest entertainment market in the country behind California. There are lots of Chinese companies that are wishing to invest in the US for a lot of reasons.

"We're looking for the investors that have the capital and interest in the entertainment industry to invest our feature films," he said. "I've met a lot here, at the SAUPO conference."

Susan Li, marketing manager at UPS Healthcare Logistics, said Chinese investment in different regions in the US is part of the trend of globalization, which provides tremendous opportunities for both countries. "We're seeing Chinese investment coming to the value-added areas like the pharmaceutical industry," Li said.

"Chinese investors are looking for the next surging and booming growth opportunity in the US and the south part of the US represents a great investment environment, such as strong government incentives, friendly community, nice climate," said Springna Zhao, special advisor to the governor's office of Alabama.

"With more exchanges between this region and China, it will not be too long for Chinese to realize the opportunities of investment here. The government and business communities here also need to work harder to bring them here. Business starts with relationship and connections first," said Zhao.

leshuodong@chinadailyusa.com