We investigated whether basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF) is effective in inducing ex vivo expansion of CD34⁺ haematopoietic progenitor cells derived from human placental and umbilical cord blood. bFGF significantly promoted the clonal growth of various haematopoietic progenitor cells, including granulocyte–macrophage colony‐forming units (CFU‐GM), mixed colony‐forming units (CFU‐Mix) and megakaryocyte colony‐forming units (CFU‐Meg) under semisolid culture conditions, with an optimal bFGF concentration of 30 ng/ml. CD34⁺ cells were then cultured in serum‐free liquid medium containing various combinations of early‐acting cytokines, including thrombopoietin (TPO), stem cell factor (SCF), interleukin 3 (IL‐3) and flt3‐ligand (FL), with or without bFGF, for 6 and 12 d. Without bFGF, TPO + IL‐3, TPO + SCF + FL and TPO +SCF + IL‐3 + FL dramatically increased the total numbers of erythroid progenitors, CFU‐GM and CFU‐Mix by d 12 of culture respectively. However, the addition of bFGF did not promote further proliferation of these progenitors, except for the erythroid progenitors, by d 6 when stimulated with all four cytokines. In contrast, total CFU‐Meg numbers were approximately doubled when these cultures were supplemented with bFGF, producing 100‐ to 120‐fold increases compared with the baseline control cultures. These results suggest that bFGF is effective in supporting the generation of megakaryocytic progenitor cells during ex vivo expansion.