New government policies covering corporate recruitment and working environment have improved conditions for staff enormously, boosting Chengdu as one of the favorite cities for overseas Chinese returnees.

According to a recent report on overseas returnees' employment and entrepreneurship, Chengdu ranked No 3 in attracting new staff in the country.

The report was released on Aug 12 by Beijing-based think tank the Center for China and Globalization and Zhaoping.com.

Li Jin, founder of HitGen, a Chengdu-headquartered biopharmaceutical company, said that many favorable factors gave him the confidence to set up business in the city.

Li returned to China in 2012 after becoming a member of the Royal Society of Chemistry in the United Kingdom. After researching the markets in several cities, he chose Chengdu.

"For a start-up company, the most important thing is a stable team of staff and strong government support," Li said.

"Chengdu has attracted scores of colleges and universities and some large pharmaceutical companies. It is also the home to hospitals including the prestigious West China Hospital, Sichuan University. The local talent pool is relatively abundant."

In addition, local government is very supportive of the development of the bio-medicines industry, Li said, providing laboratory construction subsidies and start-up capital, among other things.

In April, the company reached a research and license deal with Pfizer, one of the world's premier biopharmaceutical companies. The agreement was to collaborate with the larger group over a number of years, to build and screen novel DNA-encoded libraries, helping advance innovative drug discoveries.

HitGen also has established research partnerships with a number of prestigious international companies, including Johnson & Johnson.

Song Haitao, founder of Chengdu Idealsee Technology, returned to Chengdu after studying in the United States at Georgia Institute of Technology.

He successfully started three innovative companies in Chengdu Tianfu Software Park, with local government support.

The serious capital crises his company went through are still fresh in his memory. "Fortunately, the Chengdu government gave me strong support and helped me through it," Song said.

He said that if his company had been located somewhere else, it would not have survived.

Song said the Chengdu government has provided strong support to innovation and entrepreneurship. The city has a wide technology talent pool and a good startups atmosphere.

"Chengdu has a large number of talents in fields such as computer graphics, simulation technology, multimedia technology, game development, video transmission and problem solving," Song added.

Now Song's company boasts a research and development team of more than 200 people and it has successfully developed a series of mobile applications and intelligent wearable products, and has applied for more than 300 patents.

"The city is practical and pragmatic. I hope it will be better in the future," Song said. "With more innovative entrepreneurs working here, I am confident Chengdu will be China's Silicon Valley in the near future."

In recent years, Chengdu has introduced a series of supporting policies to lure expertise. In July it rolled out new plans to further step up its attractions campaign.

Under the Chengdu Implementation of Talent Priority Development Strategy Action Plan, graduates and postgraduates coming to work in the city will enjoy preferable policies to settle down.

The government provides rooms for job-seeking graduates in 22 locations in the city, which are free for seven days.

The city plans to build 350,000 apartments for skilled workersover the next five years, with the first-phase of construction starting in August. Qualified personnel can apply to rent an apartment and five years later when the lease ends, they can buy it at a favorable prices.

In addition, top innovation and entrepreneurship teams and personnel will get comprehensive funding of up to 100 million yuan ($15.6 million).

The government also launched a "green card" project, to draw top foreign experts.