Xinhua News Agency reported that Nanjing, Hangzhou, Ningbo, Qingdao and Wuhan occupy the sixth to tenth spots.

35 key cities across China have been selected and evaluated according to the indexes of soft environment (25%), market environment (20%), business cost environment (15%), infrastructure (15%), ecology (15%) and social services (10%).

Generally speaking, first tier cities including Guangzhou, Beijing, Shenzhen and Shanghai enjoy more advantages in terms of business environment, and long-term magnetism, drawing in talent, resource, capital and technology. These regions have active economies and also booming demand in investment and entrepreneurship, which requires the local government to provide more comprehensive services.

Some cities from middle and west of China perform well in business environment, for instance Chongqing and Wuhan have been listed among the top 10. However, the report reminds us that most cities in the middle and west of China still require improvement in their soft investment environment and thus reduce the cost of investment and start-up.

Guangzhou leads the pack in terms of soft business environment, since companies in Guangzhou enjoy a low tax rate, and also the cost of start-up and registration in Guangzhou is low.

Shenzhen takes the top spot in terms of market environment. The report advises that those top tier cities with strongly performing market environments should explore new ways to develop, as simply enlarging investment is not sufficient to stimulate further economic growth. Also the report suggests that these cities should accelerate the pace of establishing urban agglomerations and help improve the economic performance off surrounding areas.