May, 16, 2011 (India time) - ICBC 601398.SH received a business license granted by the Reserve Bank of India (India's Central Bank) for a branch in Mumbai. Earlier, China Banking Regulatory Commission has approved the Bank to set up its Mumbai Branch.

An ICBC executive said, the upcoming Mumbai Branch will be a member in India's financial market. The Bank is taking advantage of its large customer base, financial strength, network and technology to play a bigger role in serving the trade and economic between China and India, and facilitating the economic development of India.

India is the largest country in South Asia and one of the BRIC Countries. China and India have witnessed fast growth in economic and trade relation over the past few years. During the course of last five years, bilateral trade was growing at around 49% every year on average. In 2008, China has surpassed USA to become India's largest trading partner. China's trade with India reached USD 61.8 billion in the year of 2010. India is also China's largest trading partner in South Asia. The burgeoning economic and trade and investment cooperation between China and India pave the way for the development of financial sector, but pose new requirement on the banking services as well.

In recent years ICBC has escalated its international presence and scaled up its overseas subsidiaries and business areas to offer financial services across the globe, setting up a global financial service network covering all the international finance centers and China's major trading regions with well-defined hierarchy, reasonable positioning, diversified channels and efficient operation. More important, ICBC leveraged its IT strength to incorporate business operation, risk management and information sharing under one global platform. Nine product service lines have been extended overseas, namely, retail banking, bank card, electronic banking, fund clearing, professional financing, global cash management, investment banking, asset management and trade finance. FOVA (overseas subsidiaries management system), a system independently developed by ICBC, has been installed in most of the overseas subsidiaries, a significant boost to ICBC's capacity and competitiveness in serving the customers around the world.