Taiyuan -- capital city of North China's Shanxi province -- has earned great dividends from rolling out a recruitment promotion strategy that has fueled growth in high-tech companies, which have in the last three years shot up in number to 1,616 from 626 businesses. 

Taking advantage of provincial capital's pulling power due to its top universities and scientific research institutes, Taiyuan has established science and technology innovation funds totaling 1 billion yuan ($152 million) and talent development funds of 1 billion yuan for three consecutive years. 

Local authorities have granted subsidies of 5 million yuan and 3 million yuan, respectively, to local public science and technology innovation platforms at the national and provincial levels. These have helped underwrite new national and provincial laboratories, engineering and technical research centers and enterprise tech centers. 

For academician workstations and post-doctoral research workstations established in the city, establishment subsidies of 1 million yuan and 500,000 yuan, respectively, have been provided. Advanced teams in innovation, transformation and reform can win annual financial support of up to 10 million yuan a year. 

The city has also given grants for and subsidized the technological innovation of enterprises: those whose annual revenue reaches 3 million yuan and whose annual research and development expenses account for over 4 percent of sales, can each receive funding of up to 2 million yuan.

Meanwhile, enterprises that develop and trial-produce major new products, that fill a gap in related fields in China, can each receive a subsidy of up to 3 million yuan. 

As a result, the number of high-tech small and medium-sized enterprises has rocketed to 3,581 from 321 over the past three years. A total of 73 academician workstations have been established and 80 academicians were introduced to the city during the same period.