From Promise to Proof: Linking Capital and Opportunities between East and West
This is an opportune moment to reflect and take stock, as we embrace the first anniversary of the Task Force on Supporting Mainland Enterprises in Going Global (GoGlobal Task Force), the one-stop platform that pools the collective strengths of the Government, public and commercial sectors to help Chinese Mainland enterprises expand overseas through Hong Kong. A full year of its work offers a fair vantage point to ask what has actually been achieved. The clearest evidence lies not in policy papers but on the road, in more than 20 seminars that the Task Force has organised, and the two high-level delegations that carried its mission to the markets of Central Asia and ASEAN.
Both delegations travelled with a cohort of enterprises alongside officials, and that is by design. A delegation led by the Government opens doors that a company knocking alone simply cannot pass through. Backed by Hong Kong’s unique standing, these enterprises gain the opportunity to engage directly with host governments, helping them get a firmer grasp of local markets, partners and project opportunities. These two recent journeys show precisely what that looks like.
Central Asia: Proving the model at the frontier
Central Asia was a natural place to begin. Resource-rich, young and hungry for infrastructure, finance and technology, the region sits at the heart of the Belt and Road route with its needs mapping neatly onto Hong Kong’s strengths in capital and professional services. Led by the Chief Executive, the mission to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan in June was the largest delegation in this term of Government, returning with 96 agreements and memoranda worth more than US$1.65 billion, advancing a “hub-to-hub” model that casts Hong Kong as the two-way gateway between the Mainland and this new frontier.
What is most encouraging are not just the headline figures, but the business results achieved by these enterprises. Among them were leading giants of China’s gold industry, including Zijin Gold International Company Limited and Shandong Gold Group Co, Ltd. With Invest Hong Kong's (InvestHK) support, these leading enterprises are now actively exploring the development of a gold industry ecosystem in Hong Kong, seizing the vision and opportunities presented by the city’s ambition to become an international gold trading centre. Another mineral resources enterprise, Jiaxin International Resources, is the world’s first company to be dual-listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange and the Astana International Exchange in Kazakhstan and is Central Asia’s first renminbi-denominated stock — a milestone case of Hong Kong’s capital markets serving the Belt and Road Initiative.
During the mission, Jiaxin International Resources signed an Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Ministry of Industry and Construction of the Republic of Kazakhstan to deepen co-operation across three core areas: increasing annual ore extraction; introducing innovative technologies to optimise production processes; and stepping up investment in the deep processing of mineral raw materials. Drawing on Hong Kong’s professional services in international financing, cross-border asset management and international legal expertise, Jiaxin International Resources will continue to deepen its presence in Kazakhstan’s mining market.
Also on the mission was Guangzhou Pharmaceutical Holdings (GPHL), the first Traditional Chinese Medicine company to enter the Fortune Global 500, which tells a parallel story. The group's Hong Kong treasury and R&D centres serve as “dual engines”: one powering financial strength, the other innovation. In a sector where going global means navigating clinical trials, capital and market access all at once, Hong Kong’s globally recognised standards do something specific — they lower costs and compress time needed to reach markets from Southeast Asia to Europe and the US.
ASEAN: Depth close to home
If Central Asia showed the model's reach, our own neighbourhood shows its depth. The Task Force’s first ASEAN delegation, led by the Secretary for Commerce and Economic Development, Algernon Yau, travelled to Kuala Lumpur in August, taking the same approach into ASEAN, a region that has been Hong Kong’s second-largest trading partner for sixteen consecutive years, with two-way merchandise trade reaching HK$1,668.5 billion in 2025. The appetite runs both ways: in the first half of this year alone, the number of ASEAN companies InvestHK helped to set up or expand in Hong Kong rose by nearly 30 per cent year on year.
With the official opening of the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office in Kuala Lumpur, InvestHK also signed a MoU with the Malaysian Investment Development Authority to deepen bilateral co-operation. Previously in June, we had also welcomed the launch of the ASEAN Chamber of Commerce (Hong Kong), created expressly to drive two-way trade and investment between China and ASEAN. And, it is telling that one of its first acts was to form a Northern Metropolis Expert Committee, bringing in over 100 ASEAN delegates to see the opportunity on the ground. It is a neat illustration of the whole thesis: we help enterprises go out, and in doing so we draw the region in.
Many Mainland delegates hailed the trip as fruitful. Guangxi, as the nation's bridgehead facing ASEAN, hosted a major Mainland enterprises GoGlobal event in July, jointly organised by the United Front Work Department of the CPC Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Committee together with InvestHK and other Task Force members. Among our invited delegates was Runjian Co, Ltd, a leading digital intelligent operations and maintenance service provider from Guangxi, that described the Task Force as an "accelerator" for enterprises going global, particularly valuing its help in connecting businesses with crucial legal and financial services. In addition, Hillstone Networks (HK) Limited and Niufu Holding Sdn Bhd from Malaysia signed an MoU on-site at our Kuala Lumpur event, partnering on digital transformation and jointly exploring the education market with solutions integrating cybersecurity and AI.
The delegation also visited Ant International to learn about digital solutions empowering small and medium-sized enterprises in Malaysia, and Hong Leong Manufacturing Group, one of Malaysia’s largest diversified industrial companies, to discuss market strategies.
Seizing the next stage of co-operation
Beyond all these outcomes, this effort also delivers a longer-term dividend for Hong Kong’s own business environment. As Mainland champions use Hong Kong as their springboard for going global and put down roots operating here, they also deepen the city’s ecosystems in commodities, life sciences and capital. These ecosystems, in turn, make Hong Kong more compelling to the next wave of enterprises looking the other way towards the Mainland. The ASEAN Chamber's interest in the Northern Metropolis is the same current running in reverse. This is the “two-way empowerment” now visibly in motion: every outbound success strengthens our pull as an inbound destination, and each reinforces the other.
These enterprises are not exceptions; they are the leading edge of a movement that is turning Hong Kong’s institutional advantages into real commercial results. At InvestHK, our job is to keep turning vision into reality — to ensure that every company choosing Hong Kong finds not just a connection to the world, but a genuine partner in reaching it. On this first anniversary of the GoGlobal Task Force, the momentum is real, the model is proven, and the best chapters are yet to be written.
