Jakarta, October 22, 2025 — The Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business (CKGSB) made a strong showing at the annual Tech in Asia Conference 2025 in Jakarta, Indonesia, with its Founding Dean and Dean’s Distinguished Chair Professor of China Business and Globalization, Dr. Xiang Bing, delivering two major addresses on the same day.
CKGSB hosted a branded session titled “Unlocking China’s AI Advantage for SEA Founders”, the only titled event of the conference. The session attracted over 200 registrants, with 80% being C-suite executives or founders and a third representing investors and venture capital firms.
The event opened with Dean Xiang’s keynote speech, “A Global Ecosystem for the Next Generation of Unicorns,” in which he introduced CKGSB’s mission to foster responsible and innovative business leaders. He highlighted the School’s pioneering initiatives—such as embedding philanthropy and social responsibility into its curriculum—and its commitment to building a global ecosystem that empowers the next generation of entrepreneurs and unicorn founders.
Following his address, a roundtable discussion brought together distinguished speakers including Joel Neoh, Founding Partner of First Move and CKGSB alumnus; Ananda Budi Prasetya, Solution Architect Lead of AI & Big Data at Alibaba Cloud Indonesia; and Maria Li, COO of Tech in Asia, who moderated the discussion. The panel explored how Southeast Asian founders can leverage insights from China’s AI innovation to accelerate sustainable business growth in the region.
In the afternoon, Dean Xiang took to the main stage for a keynote titled “Inside China’s Innovation Playbook: Building Resilient Models in the Age of AI,” attended by more than 300 participants. He compared China’s disruption-driven innovation model with that of the US, noting that while imitation once played a major role in China’s economic rise, the country has now entered a new phase of innovation-led transformation. He emphasized that China’s experience—moving from “learning how to walk” to “learning how to run”—offers valuable lessons for emerging markets like Indonesia and across Southeast Asia.
Tech in Asia is the region’s leading English-language technology media and events platform, connecting founders, investors, and ecosystem leaders through news, insights, and its flagship annual conference.
Through its participation in Jakarta, CKGSB, the Gold partner of the event, continues to advance thought leadership, foster cross-border dialogue, and build bridges between China and Southeast Asia in innovation, technology, and entrepreneurship.
