BEIJING - China's SME board, a sub-board of the Shenzhen Stock Exchange for the listing of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), has seen fast growth since its launch a decade ago, figures from the bourse showed on Sunday.

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A total of 719 companies are now listed on the SME board, with a market value of 3.81 trillion yuan ($618.5 billion).

The number of listed companies was 19 times that in 2004, and the market value was more than 90 times that of ten years ago.

The board's market capitalization now accounts for over 40 percent of the total market value of all the listed companies on the Shenzhen bourse.

The SME board was inaugurated on May 27, 2004 to let China's smaller companies take advantage of the stock market and get much-needed capital.

The main boards of the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges, as in other countries, have been primarily focused on large companies.

Over the past decade, SMEs got a funding of more than 700 billion yuan from the sub-board.

With an emphasis on private and high-tech firms, the SME board has become a unique and indispensable segment in China's multi-tier capital market system, according to the bourse.