John Ling is a Chinese native and a naturalized US citizen.
After graduate school, Mr. Ling worked as managing director for a U.S./China joint venture, Metallic Building Systems (Asia) Inc. He worked with home appliances maker-Haier, to set up the first Chinese green-field manufacturing operation in Camden, South Carolina in 1999. He moved to Shanghai in 2005 to open South Carolina’s official office in China, with main responsibilities to recruit Chinese investment to South Carolina. Over the years, Mr. Ling has brought over $2 billion international investment projects to the southeast USA region and beyond. He has received numerous interviews by LA Times, Washington Post, BBC Worldwide and Wall Street Journal. More recently, CNBC had given a personal TV interview highlighting Mr. Ling’s work with different Chinese investment projects in the US.
In August 2015, Mr. Ling was retained by the state of Georgia as its managing director for investment in China. Mr. Ling is co-founder and past president of the Council of American States in China. He also serves as chairman of ASR Worldwide, a global quality certification company headquartered in Grand Rapids, Michigan.