SHANGHAI Mayor Yang Xiong met Karl-Ludwig Kley, chairman and CEO of Merck Group, on Wednesday.

Yang praised the German pharmaceutical company for continued investment in Shanghai, saying its focus on research and development in medicine, life science and high-performance chemicals is in line with Shanghai's effort to become an innovation center. There is a huge potential for more cooperation.

He said Shanghai is speeding up its transformation into a global innovation center and will build a number of advanced research facilities. The city already boasts a synchrotron radiation facility and the National Protein Science Center.