World's 2nd tallest building opens after two-year delay

Hong Kong

AFTER more than two years of red tape that kept tenants from moving in, China's tallest skyscraper, the Shanghai Tower, has been quietly opening and filling office space.

More than 60 companies now occupy office space on its 128 floors - including some big names in China finance, such as Ant Financial, controlled by Alibaba Group Holding Ltd's billionaire founder Jack Ma. The building's basement burger joint, Fatburger & Fatbar, is positioning itself as a go-to spot for after-work drinks.

But don't expect a party - despite the US$2.4 billion building being the most expensive ever built in China, its boast of being the second tallest in the world, having the world's fastest elevator and some of the world's most advanced architectural software and technology.

"We'd like to keep a low profile," said Cheng Luo, a spokeswoman for the tower. "We don't plan to have a grand opening celebration even if all things are ready because we've been exposed too much to the public."

The 632-metre skyscraper was supposed to open in mid-2015. But its size and complexity caused delays in clearing fire safety regulations, partly because no building codes existed for some of its features - despite China's rapid pace of development and push to champion Shanghai as a global financial centre.

"China's very much interested in promoting itself throughout the world in its embrace of economic growth and global capitalism," said Jason Barr, an economics professor at Rutgers University in New Jersey who researches real estate. "Implicit in the tower is that China's economic and political system is just as strong as Western-style capitalism."

The complexity of the tower, with its twisting double skin designed to reduce sway in the wind plus its fire-proof elevators, shows how China's regulations are struggling to keep up with the pace of technological development. Industries from aerospace to construction and military hardware are adopting and even inventing some of the world's most advanced systems, yet China's regulatory bodies are often still hobbled by practices and rules created decades ago.

"There was a constant sort of push-pull during the project where we would design something for which there was no code, so we would need to write a code, and this went back and forth for nearly seven years," said Dan Winey, chief operating officer of Gensler, the architectural firm that designed the tower. The new codes included the use of elevators for evacuation during a fire, a first for a high-rise building in China.

The observation deck opened to the public in April, but it wasn't until June that it was cleared by fire safety authorities, according to state-owned Shanghai Municipal Investment (Group) Corp, one of the tower's major investors.

The building was declared officially completed on July 18.

Seven Beers Fatburger, with a mix of foreigners and Chinese, has a red-felt-topped pool table, seven beers on tap, and a bartender who can whip up frozen drinks. Other tower fare includes Hong Kong dim sum, Hainanese chicken, Shanghai dumplings and Japanese ramen.

Ant Financial moved into three and a half floors at the end of March, becoming the largest tenant among the 34 occupied floors of office space. Munich-based Allianz SE opened there in August, while insurer Lloyd's of London Ltd did in September. BLOOMBERG