Three of India's four largest software companies -- Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Infosys Technologies, and Satyam Computer Services, -- have started business in the software park and the third largest Indian software company, WIPO, is negotiating entrance to the park.

"China's software market has a great potential and rosy future, especially in the Yangtze River Delta," said a senior manager of the TCS.

TCS would develop software for finance, securities, insurance and telecommunications with Chinese partners and set up a research institute and laboratory with local universities, he added.

The software park in Pudong, a district of Shanghai, had attracted around 1,000 enterprises with the investment worth of 2.3 billion yuan from domestic companies and US$210 million from abroad by June this year.

Several large foreign companies have already established themselves here, including US-based Synopsys, Citibank, Microsoft, Sony, Kyocera and Core.

Meanwhile, a number of domestic companies and high-technology research programs have entered the software park, such as the research and data processing center of China UnionPay and the anti-computer virus research center under the country's high and new technology research and development program (program 863).

The city has invested 300 million yuan in expanding the software park by 94,000 square meters. The new area aims to attract leading software companies and promising small and medium-sized firms.

About 58 million yuan will be spent on an advanced technical service platform in the park, including a wide band network, shared data center and software export service.

The software park is expected to attract 2,000 companies with the total output worth of 13 billion yuan in 2005.

(Xinhua News Agency August 20, 2002)