Shanghai SOEs aim for mixed owners

Shanghai aims to restructure its state-owned enterprises to mixed ownership in three to five years, the city government said yesterday as it unveiled measures to push forward SOE reform.

"Shanghai SOEs should actively participate in international mergers and acquisitions to improve core competitiveness and strengthen global presence," Shanghai's Party Secretary Han Zheng said in a meeting with the city's SOEs yesterday.

Han said the city will launch platforms to help restructure SOEs into public firms through open and market-oriented capital operations in the second half of the year as it moves to distance the government from managing the SOEs and to optimize the allocation of national resources.

By the end of 2013, the number of mixed-ownership enterprises has accounted for 63 percent of the total SOEs in Shanghai, contributing to 92.4 percent of the net profits of SOEs, according to Zhou Bo, the city's deputy mayor.

"Although Shanghai's economy has been dominated by mixed-ownership firms, problems such as excessive state-owned equity and inflexible corporate management remain," Zhou said.

Last year, Shanghai divided its SOEs into three categories — competitive SOEs, functional SOEs and public utility SOEs — each with different objectives.

It will promote public listings of primary business assets in competitive SOEs and competitive business assets in the other two types of SOEs.

The government also plans to unveil market-oriented incentives, including stock-based compensation and profit-sharing bonus, when it lists the SOEs by the end of the year.