With the increasing trade between China and Latin America, Shenzhen-based Guanghe has become the first PRC firm to establish an office in Latin America. The firm has recently set up a branch in Uruguay, which is operated under the name Guanghe Sud-America.
The Uruguay office of Guanghe, led by partner Hu Xiaolin, will mainly focus on investment and immigration, and is in the process of hiring local lawyers.
"The initial idea of opening an office there is because more and more of my clients are interested in investing in South America, and two of my clients have already established pharmaceutical factories in Brazil, ” said Tong Xin (pictured), the founding partner of Guanghe. “After research, we finally chose Uruguay due to its relatively strong legal system and preferential polices for foreign investors.”
"At the same time, the operation cost and competition in Uruguay are lower than in Brazil,” said Tong. Currently, only very few foreign firms have offices in Uruguay while Brazil plays host to many international firms.
"With the increasing bilateral trade and cross-border investment between China and South American countries, I expect more PRC firms to set up in South America,” Tong said.
Since China and Uruguay established diplomatic relations in 1988, trade between China and Uruguay has been growing at a very fast pace. According to CCPIT, the China-Uruguay bilateral trade reached US$867m in June 2010, up 61.7% year-on-year. Chery Automobile, Huawei Technologies and ZTE Corporation have entered Uruguay market.
In addition to opening the Uruguay office, Guanghe has also launched offices in Beijing, Chengdu and Wuhan in the past year. It now has 350 lawyers across Beijing, Chengdu, Wuhan, Zhuhai, New York and Uruguay offices. ALB
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*This table does not purport to be exhaustive
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