(Yicai Global) May 6 -- A group of 27 multinational companies who chose Shanghai for their regional headquarters or research and development centers have gotten recognition from the city.

Shanghai Mayor Ying Yong issued certificates to the 22 regional headquarters and five R&D centers of these multinational corporations at a ceremony city officials held today.

Firms included Apple, consulting firm Accenture, sports goods maker Nike, comprehensive sports goods retailer Decathlon, fertilizer and raw materials trader Trammo Shanghai Trading.

Shanghai's newly established foreign-funded projects, contractual foreign investment, and actual utilized foreign capital rose 43.4 percent, 33.7 percent, and 20.3 percent, respectively in the first quarter. ,Ten multinational regional headquarters and five foreign-funded R&D centers were founded. These data fully demonstrate that multinational companies haven't changed their willingness to invest long-term in Shanghai, believes Xu Kunlin, the city's deputy mayor.

Shanghai's foreign firms, which only make up 2 percent of the city's total, contribute about one-quarter of its gross domestic product, about one-third of the tax revenue, and about two-thirds of the foreign trade imports and exports and the gross output value of industrial enterprises above a designated scale, Xu added.

The eastern megacity had cumulatively introduced 97,000 foreign-funded projects, USD471.2 billion of contractual foreign investment and USD240.4 billion of actual foreign investment by the end of last year, according to the city's commerce commission. Shanghai had 670 regional headquarters of MNCs, including 88 Asia-Pacific regional headquarters and 441 foreign-funded R&D centers, 65 of which are high-level Asia-Pacific regional ones. 

Editor: Zhang Yushuo