SAN FRANCISCO — A recruitment fair based in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou has launched a campaign in the United States to attract innovative companies or individuals to start their business in China, organizers said on July 25.

The Convention on Exchange of Overseas Talents and Guangzhou Convention of Overseas Chinese Scholars in Science and Technology (OCS), a high-level official recruitment fair, has launched the 2018 “Talents Make Future” Overseas Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition.

Registration for the event will last through Aug 31. The organizers said it’s an innovative competition which aims to attract about 100 hi-tech companies to develop their business in China this year.

Regional contests will be held in the US cities of Boston and Seattle, the British capital London, and Japan from late July to November, to select 55 winners in the preliminary race for the final competition scheduled for December 2018.

Candidates including firms, individuals, patent owners or holders, or projects with technologies that fit the key needs of economic and social development of Guangzhou, or core technologies that have full intellectual property (IP) rights without dispute can apply for a place in the competition, the organizers said.

The final winners will be offered opportunities to meet their business partners and investors, field trips to incubator parks and roadshows, access to financial credit and project or policy support, and, most importantly, a start-up fund of two million yuan (about $295,330).

The OCS-hosted competition is the largest and most influential overseas talent exchange event in China, which is dedicated to providing a solid platform for overseas innovative talent, entrepreneurship, and incubation and commercialization of technological achievements.

Fifty-six overseas companies have returned to China via the OCS platform, according to the organizers.