Bavaria is one of the strongest powerhouses that establish friendly relations with Shandong. Both sides have attached great importance to the cooperation on economy and trade since when they established a sister province/state tie.

In 1985, then Minister-President of Bavaria Franz Josef Strauss led a 400-enterprises business delegation to Shandong Province, which marks a prelude to the friendly relationship between Shandong and Bavaria. The delegation consists of almost all renowned companies in Bavaria, such as Audi, BMW, Mann, Siemens, Singha Beer and Liebherr.

In response, Shandong held a large-scale comprehensive exhibition in 1987, the year both sides officially being sisiter province/state. Hereafter Shandong and Bavaria have been developing cooperative relations in various fields.

Germany is regarded as the strongest economy of European Union (EU), who has exceeded America being China’s biggest trade partner. As an economic heavyweight of Germany, Bavaria enjoys one third of the total investment of Germany to Shandong. Roughly Bavaria has invested over 30 projects in Shandong, with foreign capital actually utilized over 1.2 billion yuan.

The most representative programs invested be Bavaria companies include the transformer project invested by Simens in Jinan, the equity transfer and technical cooperation project between MAN Group and Sinotruck Group, the axle project of Jinan SAF AL-KO Co,. Ltd., and the vehicle project of Yantai SAF AL-KO Co Ltd., and so on.

Besides, Bavaria’s Siemens Group and 52 large-scale state-owned enterprises of Shandong take concerted action towards energy conservation and emission reduction.

In 2012, Shandong Heavy Industry Group (SHIG) bought 25 percent of Kion Group’s share and 70 percent of Linde Group’s stake for 0.738 billion yuan. This becomes China’s largest direct business investment in Germany.