High-tech businesses are helping to fuel economic development in China's capital city, as their number has topped 13,000, said the Beijing Municipal Science and Technology Committee.
  
During the first half of this year, local high-tech industries added value amounted to 17 billion yuan (US$2 billion), up 20 percent on a yearly basis.
  
With the exception of aeronautic and astronautic fields, all other high-tech sectors in Beijing maintained a two-digit growth this year.
  
The industry garnered 20.3 billion yuan (US$2.44 billion) in software sales alone from January to June this year, up 35 percent year-on-year.
  
Beijing exported 2.12 billion dollars of high-tech products during the first half year, up 48.6 percent year-on-year, accounting for 24 percent of local exports of the corresponding period.

(Xinhua News Agency August 7, 2004)