(Xinhua)The World Economic Forum (WEF) announced Friday that it will host its first World Economic Forum on Growth in China's northeastern coastal city of Dalian next September.

The forum aims to hold a "summer Davos" bringing together emerging companies from around the world rather than world economic leaders, the focus of the annual Davos Meeting held in Switzerland.

The first World Economic Forum on Growth is also the inaugural Annual Meeting of Global Growth Companies.

Growth and competitiveness were the themes of the annual meeting, said Andr Schneider, managing director of the WEF.

China's astonishing economic growth and the emergence of many new companies were the major reasons the WEF chose China as the site for the annual meeting.

The WEF set up the headquarters of the Community of Global Growth Companies (CGGC) in Beijing as well as its first overseas representative office this year.

The CGGC aims to enable emerging multinationals to develop into the next generation of international corporate leaders.

An annual growth of over 15 percent over the last two years, a minimum revenue of 200 million to two billion US dollars according to industry and region, demonstrated executive leadership and multinational operations are the requirements for membership.

The annual meeting held in China will be the flagship event of the CGGC.

More than 300 CGGC companies will attend the inaugural annual meeting from September 6 to 8.

The WEF is already working with the authorities of a second Chinese city, Tianjin, neighboring Beijing, to host the meeting in 2008.

The WEF was founded in 1971 in Geneva with a commitment to improve the state of the world. The annual Davos meeting sees business and political elites from around the world gather at the beginning of each year to gauge the global economic outlook and to discuss global issues.