Government boost for university tech parks

The Shanghai government announced on Wednesday that it will enhance the role of science and technology parks of the city’s universities to boost innovation.

Three to five leading tech parks are expected to become regional innovation centers to generate hundreds of billions yuan in annual output and yield 10,000 tech companies “with high potential” by 2025.

The government said it will push for the universities to share their resources in innovation with other parties, including research facilities and data, while teachers and students will be encouraged to start their own businesses.

There are currently 13 national-level university tech parks in Shanghai, accounting for 11 percent of all those around China.

The government said those tech parks have given rise to 100 "little giant" companies, 539 high-tech companies and 66 listed companies since 1991.