Sinomach seeks to invest more abroad

During the 11th Five-Year Plan (2006-10), Sinomach's sales from the contract engineering business jumped by as much as 200 percent.

Against the backdrop of Chinese companies flexing their muscles in going abroad since the financial crisis, Sinomach is quickening its step.

"We are a freshman as an investor", but the company is highly passionate in investing abroad, Xu said.

In 2011, Sinomach acquired the agricultural machinery parts maker McCormick France SAS in a deal worth 8 million euros ($11.19 million) in an attempt to strengthen its dominant position in the domestic high-end tractor market.

In 2012, China CAMC Engineering Co Ltd, a subsidiary of Sinomach, took a 60 percent stake in Vancouver-based Procon Holdings (Alberta) Inc, also a mining contracting and mining service provider, for 737 million yuan ($117 million), which helped Sinomach enter the North American engineering market.

Since the global financial crisis, China's outbound direct investment has been rising, despite a drop in foreign direct investment worldwide, and in 2011 the country became the fifth largest investing nation worldwide in terms of volume.

However, China's "going global" strategy started with bids for contract engineering projects abroad a few decades ago by a slew of State-owned enterprises, led by Sinomach, which built up a variety of infrastructure and facilities including roads, bridges, electricity plants, schools and hospitals.

While Chinese companies became more involved in overseas projects and their names became increasingly recognized in foreign communities, they also started investment projects in recent years, either through setting up factories or conducting mergers and acquisitions.

In 2012, the nation's ODI in the non-financial sector grew 28.6 percent year-on-year to $77.2 billion, according to the Ministry of Commerce.