Watch CKGSB Dean Xiang Bing’s feature in CCTV’s ‘Biz Asia’, as he discusses the further opening up of China’s economy and promoting understanding between corporations.
2014-04-09 – CKGSB successfully held its 5th annual China-Japan CEO Roundtable in Tokyo on April 9th, 2014. This year’s roundtable focused on the keyword “growth”. After witnessing several years of supercharged growth, China has seen its gradual deceleration in 2013. At the same time, Japan has struggled with jumpstarting its stagnant economy in recent years. While both countries have passed a number of reforms aimed at bolstering growth to attractive and sustainable levels, it is clear that for individual businesses, opportunities lie in fast-growing markets and sectors. How should companies position themselves, both strategically and geographically, to most effectively leverage such pockets of opportunity?
When speaking about China, professors and alumni of Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business (CKGSB) have no hesitation in discussing its problems. But, in their eyes, pollution, corruption or the housing bubble are not sources of worry or frustration. Rather, these are opportunities to make a difference. Freda Wan of South China Morning Post discusses this phenomenon and how CKGSB can capitalize on these opportunities.
Li Ka Shing, CEO of Cheung Kong Group, is known as one of the richest people in Asia. CKGSB, founded by the Li Ka Shing Foundation in 2002, has made a great leap in becoming one of the best business schools in China. CKGSB’s world-class faculty is also highly reputed. CKGSB Professor Teng Bingsheng, who visited Seoul to make a keynote speech at the ‘2014 Asian Leadership Conference’, said that proper strategic alliance such as ‘Strategic Investor’ relations between Korean and Chinese companies could enhance both countries’ key industries.
Chinese companies are actively pursuing M&A to enhance their dominance in the overseas industry and predominate the domestic market. Last year, overseas M&A of Chinese companies grew more than 200%. In an interview with Fortune Korea, Teng Bingsheng, CKGSB Associate Dean, forecasted that the large-scale M&A will actively take place over the next 10 years. He explained that this trend will help companies shorten the market entry process to global standards by accumulating R&D capabilities”.
Although many industry experts have shown pessimistic views towards the future of the Chinese economy, some optimists still suggest that Chinese authorities will not close their eyes on the economic hard-landing and claim that the Chinese government has plans to re-charge its stagnant economy. Professor Li Haitao, CKGSB Associate Dean, is one of such optimists. He maintains the positive view on the Chinese economy and forecasts that “China would safely achieve its 7 – 7.5% potential growth rate objective”.
CKGSB Professor Li Haitao pointed out CKGSB’s competitive edges as follows. Firstly, CKGSB has an unrivalled alumni network. Out of 4,000 CKGSB alumni, there are many high-level public authorities and private corporate CEOs. Professor Li said “Out of top 500 companies in China, 100 corporate CEOs are CKGSB alumni”. A world-class faculty is another strong point of CKGSB. He said “CKGSB faculty is the best not only in China but even when including Singapore and Hong Kong. There are 40 full-time professors born and raised in China who obtained Ph.D degrees in the privileged universities in the western countries, which means they have profound western knowledge as well as deeper insight into China.”
On Saturday, March 29th, CKGSB hosted its 3rd annual Young Investors Forum, a series of discussions led by industry experts and executives as well as key CKGSB faculty, pertaining to the most relevant investment themes of today. Yang Jing of Global Times discusses the key themes and takeaways from the event, including major challenges and opportunities going forward.
Professor Li Haitao, CKGSB Associate Dean, positively forecasted China’s economic growth potential at the 7th Asia Pacific Financial Forum (APFF), co-hosted by Aju Business Daily and Hong Kong Wenweipo, on March 27 at the Plaza Hotel in Seoul. Professor Li claimed the golden age of the Chinese economy has yet to come, and that China’s economic potential is still immense. Professor Li described that ’13 billion Chinese citizens’ desire to improve life’, ‘Development gap between the East coast and the inland area’ and ‘the Chinese government’s willingness towards economic reform’ to be the main drivers for this growth.
CKGSB MBA has expanded its scholarship program for supporting overseas Chinese and individuals of Chinese heritage to study in China and become valuable members of China’s business community. This expansion increases the funds CKGSB MBA dedicates to the Scholarship for Outstanding Overseas Chinese Professionals to 5 Million RMB.
Bloomberg BusinessWeek’s Dexter Roberts interviews CKGSB Professor Teng Bingsheng on potential cross-border M&A activity within the global agricultural sector.
Chinese electronics retailers such as Suning Dianqi (苏宁电器) and Gomei (国美) have grown as giant corporations based on their domestic market dominance. In particular, Suning Dianqi achieved CNY 233 billion worth of revenue, outperforming China’s top home appliance retailer, Haier (海尔). Due to the two giant retailers’ market dominance, Samsung Electronics is now having difficulties establishing the independent retail network. CKGSB Dean Xiang Bing said that “since Chinese companies are based on the vast domestic market, there are many paths for Chinese firms to turn themselves into global companies” and that “this can be the great advantage for Chinese firms compared to those from Korea and Japan”.