BEIJING, Dec. 2 (Xinhua) -- The Chinese capital of Beijing has solidified its appeal as a hub for foreign investment through continuous efforts to improve its business environment.

Beijing hosts 252 regional headquarters of multinational companies and 149 foreign-funded research and development (R&D) centers. In the first eight months of 2024, 121 major foreign-funded R&D centers in the municipality invested 13.77 billion yuan (about 1.92 billion U.S. dollars) in R&D, up 29.9 percent year on year.

"Beijing has consistently prioritized improving its business environment as a crucial strategy to transform government functions, boost the vitality of enterprises, and strengthen the internal drivers of economic growth," Beijing's Deputy Mayor Sima Hong said.

For seven consecutive years, the Beijing municipal government has updated its business environment reform plan -- introducing more than 1,500 reform measures in this process.

Tetsuro Homma, executive vice president of Panasonic Holdings Corporation and group chief executive for China & Northeast Asia, told Xinhua that since Panasonic established its joint venture in Beijing in 1987, the company has witnessed and benefited significantly from improvements in the city's business environment.

"China boasts a vast market, a comprehensive industrial and supply chain, strong adaptability to new technologies, and immense economic development potential, offering enterprises extensive opportunities for growth," said Homma.

"Major foreign firms are bullish on China's long-term growth prospects," said Li Yang, secretary-general of the Beijing Association of Enterprises with Foreign Investment, while adding that foreign firms continue to regard the country as a preferred investment destination.

To improve its business environment further, Beijing is also striving to transform and elevate its reform achievements into regulations.

On July 1 this year, Beijing's first special regulation on foreign investment took effect. Moreover, Beijing on Friday passed the newly revised regulation on optimizing its business environment, representing the capital's latest effort to promote further opening up and boost its appeal to global investors. This regulation took effect in 2020 and was first revised in 2022.

Zhang Jiachun, managing partner of Chinese law firm East & Concord Partners, noted that this effort will further foster a stable, fair, transparent and predictable business environment.

"The revision of the regulation demonstrates the municipal government's strong commitment to enhancing the business environment and supporting enterprise development in the city -- which reinforces our confidence in growing in Beijing," said Yu Feng, president of Honeywell China, adding that the company will expand its investment in the capital.

Honeywell, a Fortune 500 company headquartered in the United States, has been present in the Chinese market for nearly 90 years. It has formed a full value chain in China, ranging from manufacturing and technology R&D to procurement and supply chain, and has actively joined hands with upstream and downstream enterprises in the supply chain to effectively integrate into local economic development.