A report released by real-estate consultancy CB Richard Ellis, on Wednesday, has ranked Asian cities on four of the top five spots for international businesses. Singapore has secured a second place followed by Tokyo, London and Shanghai. The study has tagged southern Chinese city at top most position for media, technology and telecoms firms.

The report named as Business Footprints: Global Office Locations 2011 suggested that Asian countries have proved their potential and Asia's dominance in ranking of the world's leading business hubs is striking and claimed to analyze office locations for 280 international firms and observed that approximately 68% of the respondents, or 191 firms, had an office in Hong Kong whereas about 67.5% or 189 companies, had an office in Singapore.

The Director of the real-estate firm's research for Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan, Edward Farrelly, had marked Hong Kong in a "unique position" having influence from its location, lack of foreign ownership rules, tri-lingual mix and international, highly-skilled workforce. Further, he added that Hong Kong is a key gateway city for accessing China and is set to benefit most from the gradual liberalization of the Chinese financial services markets

"Singapore's ranking attests to the quality, quantity and competitive cost of Singapore's office space in attracting businesses”, added the head of CBRE Research in Singapore and South East Asia, Petra Blazkova.