The signing ceremony of the 42 foreign-funded projects is held in Shanghai on Sept 16. [Photo/WeChat account: Pudong Fabu]

Forty-two foreign-funded projects worth a total of $7.7 billion were signed in Shanghai on Sept 16, covering the areas of biomedicines, the chemicals industry, new energy, commerce and trade, as well as finance.

Of the projects, Pudong New Area landed 12 major deals worth $3.39 billion, accounting for 44 percent of the total investment value.

The latest statistics released showed that Shanghai was home to the regional headquarters of 701 multinationals by the end of August -- 106 from the Asia-Pacific region -- indicating that the city is not only the operations center of many transnational corporations in China, but also an important market in its own right in the Asia-Pacific region.

Driven by the growth of its buoyant headquarters economy, Shanghai attracted an increasing amount of foreign investment in the first eight months of this year.

According to statistics released by the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Commerce, the city witnessed respective year-on-year increases of 47.8 percent, 9.6 percent and 13.4 percent in the number of newly invested projects, contracted foreign investment value and actual foreign investment value from January to August this year.