Lockdown over but market regulator continues to serve firms with new ideas

Ti Gong

Chen Huiqing and her colleagues at Yangpu District's market regulator answered nearly 1,000 phone calls from local companies during Shanghai's COVID-19 lockdown in April and May.

Despite being locked down at home during the city's severest COVID resurgence, Chen, director of the registration department of the Yangpu District Administration for Market Regulation, managed to finish the online business registration for nearly 500 companies, mostly food and medical firms that ensured a lifeline for residents during the lockdown.

An antigen testing kit manufacturer, for instance, needed to expand its business urgently. A facial mask wholesaler asked to get a business license to sell additional medical equipment. Other companies needed to change shareholding and registered capital.

Chen, 40, served as a key coordinator to solve difficulties for the companies, while asking for supportive policies from city-level authorities.

"Such a lockdown was unprecedented for the companies, so the number of issues was soaring," she recalled.

Chen served as a volunteer in her community to assist in nucleic acid testing every morning and catered to companies' needs on the phone until late night.

The lockdown made it impossible for company officials to sign on application forms or submit essential materials to the market watchdog.

Chen and her colleagues then developed an innovative approval measure that allowed companies to present materials later after making a promise. Chen said it did not mean the approval policy was relaxed, but required her team to do more meticulous evaluation.

For applicants who could not sign on the forms during the lockdown, for instance, Chen would confirm with their legal representatives and shareholders via video conference.

The measure has proved to be helpful, especially when the city gradually returned to normal operation in late May. Many companies and restaurants needed to update their licenses or change business contents for the work resumption.

Ti Gong

Chain restaurant KFC's business license was due by May 4. Chen applied to the city's market watchdog and allowed the company to postpone the submission of paper materials.

She extended the business license duration for 191 KFC outlets within a week, which were designated by the city government to ensure daily food supplies for residents.

Even after the city emerged from the two-month lockdown, the approval measure is being used for companies affected by global logistics gridlock, Chen pointed out.

As the pandemic waned in June, Chen led her team to develop more innovative services for the increasing number of companies, which needed to resume their operation or start new businesses after the long lockdown.

An all-in-one QR code for the registration of new companies has been developed by Chen's team and is expected to be promoted across the city due to its convenience.

New companies can submit their registration materials online, such as real estate certificate and leasing contract, to get a QR code. They only need to show the code to the registration staff at the service window, rather than bringing a pile of paper documents with them.

Since the code was launched in late June, more than 30 companies have uploaded their basic information and materials onto the QR code platform and some 20 of them have finished registration or applications with the code.

In another innovative measure, Chen led in creating a digital sample on how a new restaurant should decorate and arrange its kitchen to acquire a business license.

She came up with the idea after many food companies failed to meet the decoration criteria while applying for a license during the lockdown. Various indicators are too professional for many business runners, but such a sample kitchen can make the standard easier to understand, according to Chen.

By clicking on the website of the sample kitchen, food companies can learn how to properly install the sink, operating platform or delivery windows.

After it proved popular with food companies, the Yangpu market watchdog has developed three kinds of samples for a restaurant, a beverage store and a bakery. They are available on the official WeChat account of the administration and the lobby of the district's administrative service center.

Ti Gong

To create more such innovative measures, Chen has established a workshop with 45 young staff members of the administration. Instead of serving company staff behind service windows, members of the workshop visit companies and offer door-to-door services. Chen serves as the "chief service officer."

"The requirements of companies have been changing with the rapid development of the industries. Our services must also keep up with the trend," she observed.

Yangpu is home to many leading Internet companies, such as livestream platform Bilibili, delivery firms JD-Daojia and Dada as well as a real-time audio-video service provider Agora. They have been growing rapidly in Yangpu despite the COVID-19 pandemic.

Many companies have asked to add new businesses such as on metaverse and block chain in their registration. Chen led the team members to study the concepts and trends of the new industries and research on how to adapt the policies to the new business sectors.

For instance, Meituan, a comprehensive online food and grocery shopping platform, had to apply for a food business license for each of its large number of offline branches. After research, Chen found that the new convenient policy for chain restaurants can also be applied to Meituan to largely simplify the application processes.

Zhang Ying, public relations director of Meituan, said Chen's efforts have saved a lot of trouble for the company.

"We used to have to go to the government bodies ourselves, but now Chen and her colleagues come to us actively," he said.

Though Chen has been working at the market regulation administration for decades, she said she was still a freshman for the registration department.

"I will keep using my fresh ideas to involve more innovative measures to create an appealing business environment," she added.

Yang Jian / SHINE