SHANGHAI—Chinese state-owned conglomerate Greenland Holding Group said Monday it expects to reach its targeted 20 billion yuan (US$3.27 billion) in overseas revenue this year, and that its overseas revenue will double in 2015.
Shanghai-based Greenland has been the most aggressive Chinese property developer to expand abroad since 2013, investing a total of US$20 billion purchasing land and other real-estate projects in nine countries including Australia, the U.S., the U.K., Canada and South Korea.
Greenland, which isn’t listed on the domestic stock exchange, said it is targeting its overseas revenue to make up a larger portion of the company’s revenue, to exceed 25 per cent of its revenue by 2020. It is targeting total revenue of 240 billion yuan this year, which means overseas income currently accounts for less than 10 per cent of the company’s revenue.
“From the start, Greenland’s international expansion strategy was ‘Only succeed, failure is not allowed’,” said Greenland Chairman Zhang Yuliang. As one of the first Chinese companies to venture abroad, Greenland “hope to prove that Chinese capital and Chinese brand have the ability to assimilate and be rooted in the international market,” Mr. Zhang added.
These comments come as Chinese investors and builders venture abroad to diversify their operations in the face of a domestic property downturn. But this has created tension in some countries, amid complaints housing prices are rising beyond the reach of local buyers due to the influx of flush Chinese buyers.
Greenland said its sales in Sydney projects are expected to exceed 4.8 billion yuan this year, while in Canada, its sales from the launch of its project there have reached 700 million yuan. In Los Angeles, it has secured preliminary interest from more than 500 customers, of which 80 per cent are locals, it said in the statement. In London, customers are also interested in buying homes in its Ram Brewery project, with potential sales totaling 525 million yuan, it added.
Mr. Zhang said in the statement that Greenland has changed its focus to target customers all over the world, from targeting Chinese customers from mainland China when it first started to invest abroad.
“In the U.S. for example where our development projects are funded by EB-5 visa funding, preliminary calculations show that these projects have created 20,000 jobs,” Greenland said in a statement.