Three US-based companies and one leading British Virgin Islands specialist offshore law firm set up their regional headquarters in Hong Kong in the month of June.
Among the three US-based companies, two are headquartered in California. Fortinet, Inc., the pioneer and leading provider of multi-threat security solutions is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California. It has customer support, development and sales facilities throughout the America, Europe and Asia. The Hong Kong office will lead and coordinate the sales and support of the company’s operations in the Asia Pacific region.
Managing Director, Ricky Ho, explains Fortinet’s choice to site the Asia Pacific operations hub in that territory. “Hong Kong is a great place for Asia Pacific’s headquarters because of its location in the heart of the region, its proximity to the large markets in China and India, the rule of law, its educated and highly skilled workforce, and its efficient and advanced infrastructure for business,” he said.
Another US-based on-demand business services Salesforce.com also opened its first Hong Kong office in June. The office will drive sales and marketing activities for the growing local customer base, and will support the company’s expansion in Greater China.
Speaking at the opening ceremony, President and Asia Pacific CEO of Salesforce.com Stephen Russell said that the company is experiencing explosive growth across Asia. “Because of Hong Kong’s dynamic commercial environment, sophisticated workforce and geographic location, we are incredibly enthusiastic about the springboard that this city will provide as we continue to expand – both domestically and across Greater China,” he said.
The company’s Salesforce suite of on-demand applications enables customers to manage and share all of their sales, support, marketing and partner information on-demand. “Hong Kong businesses are realizing that business success should not be limited by the traditional requirements of large software budgets, accompanied by costly upgrade cycles,” said Mr. Russell. “We therefore believe Hong Kong will be a fantastic fit for our value proposition – a sophisticated environment with advanced application usage and strong internet infrastructure.”
Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) also announced the opening its new Asia Pacific regional headquarters in Hong Kong to capture growing opportunities in the region. CME offers futures and options on futures products in every major asset class to customers around the globe.
“While we have had a presence in the Asia Pacific region for some time, we felt now as the right time to expand our reach by establishing a new regional headquarters in Hong Kong to facilitate further expansion of our product offerings and increased levels of service to our Asian-based customers.
“Hong Kong was the clear choice of location due to its close relationship with Mainland China, its role as the regional financial hub, and its IT infrastructure and communications links with the region,” said CME’s Managing Director, Products and Services, Asia, C.F. Wong.
Another firm that made Hong Kong as its regional base for the Asia Pacific is WSmiths, the leading British Virgin Islands (BVI) specialist offshore law firm.
