International Trip
Each year our EMBA program includes an International travel component and in March, our students traveled to Southeast Asia, including Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam and China. The study focus of the trip was the hospitality and tourism industry.
Click here for a full review and photographs from organizer Chris Runckel of Runckel & Associates.
The Loyola Marymount EMBA program has always included a visit to one or more major, non-U.S. business centers to provide an understanding of business practices, political realities, and social and cultural sensitivities required to work in the global business environment. In the first few years of the program students visited Europe, to both the developed economies of Western Europe and the emerging economies of Eastern Europe.
In 2006, recognizing the importance of Asia to the Los Angeles business community, we shifted our focus visiting Shanghai and Beijing, China, and Hanoi, Vietnam. In 2007, we traveled to Thailand, India and China. Abridged reports and links to full articles appear below.
2007
From March 2nd through
March 18th, we visited India, China and Thailand. We started in Bangkok, Thailand. Our group was privileged to receive presentations on the importance of biotechnology in developing countries from Dr. Yongyuth Yuthavong, Thailand’s Minister of Science and Technology, and principals from BIOTEC. This was followed by a personal tour of Bumrungrad Hospital. Bangkok is a hub of “medical tourism” and hospitals such as Bumrungrad care for over one million foreign nationals. Bumrungrad is the largest hospital in Southeast Asia and the modern facilities boast U.S. and European trained physicians.
The next stop was Bangalore, India, which is located in the southern part of the country and represents a chaotic mix of well-established call centers, business process outsourcing, computer software centers, manufacturing and more traditional cottage industries. We met with executives from Biocon, and then took in the Infosys campus, which really has to be seen to be believed. The campus resembles a University location in Southern California – green lawns, modern buildings and facilities populated by a young highly educated workforce.
In line with the overall ethos of LMU’s EMBA program, learning about our host country’s history and culture holds as much relevance as understanding the business environment. We visited Mysore to receive a briefing on local culture and development followed by an illuminating talk on the Southern Indian political and business climate from Dr. Narendar Pani, Editor of the Bangalore edition of the
Economic Times. Our delegation also met with the Indian Institute of Management (IIM) Bangalore to discuss management and business development in India.
Flying on to New Delhi, we enjoyed visits to signature scenic sites such as the Red Fort, Birlan Temple, Parliament, President’s House and India Gate. That weekend we went to Agra and the stunning Taj Mahal, where we marveled at the architectural perfection and diversity that represents India.
On the following Monday, U.S. Embassy Deputy Chief of Mission Geoff Pyatt and others spoke with the group on Indian–U.S. relations, the developing business climate in India, Indian biotechnology and other subjects. We then visited India’s “Pudong” in Gurgaon where most of New Delhi’s multi-national companies are located. On Tuesday the group met with the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) followed by a panel discussion at Panacea Biotec, India’s third largest biotech company.
That evening we flew to Beijing for the final leg of our journey. The Beijing Center for Chinese Studies hosted our first day where our group examined Chinese traditional culture, and Chinese values and business etiquette. At the Center we enjoyed an opportunity to meet with Chinese MBA students.
The final day of the official business program was led off by a presentation from Mr. Jack Perkowski, President and Chairman of ASIMCO, China’s largest automobile parts manufacturer. Our group went on to meet with Crown Bioscience, Inc (Beijing) where President of China operations William Pan compared China and India in terms of biotech research. Over the weekend, we had the opportunity to visit the Great Wall, the Forbidden City and other historic locations.
All in all, it was a life-changing visit, opening our eyes to the complexity and promise that the developing economies of India, China and Thailand represent. (
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2006
In Shanghai, we began the China leg of our trip with visits to Suzhou near Shanghai, a leading center for the high-tech industry in China. The delegation visited Suzhou New & High Tech Development Zone (SND) where senior members of the industrial parks leadership described how industrial parks operate in China. The team then visited three companies – one in the industrial park and two other in a neighboring park and were able to see at first hand the various aspects of multinational investment in China. A highlight of the visit to Shanghai was a one and a half hour presentation to the group about the challenges of doing business in China by Kevin Wale, President and CEO of General Motors, China.
In Beijing, the executive team participated in a one-day program of lectures at the Beijing Center for Language and Culture at the University of International Business and Economics (UIBE) and at Beijing International Master’s in Business Administration (BIMBA) where presentations were made by the Head of CNN China among others. No visit to China is complete without visits to such sites as the Forbidden City and the Great Wall. This was valuable first-hand exposure for the team to the cultural complexity that China represents as both an ancient civilization at the same time that the country also is a country of youth and change.
Following China, the team moved on to Hanoi, Vietnam where they encountered a much smaller but rapidly developing business environment that has many different but just as complex business realities. Vietnam, like China, is a country of young people with over half of the population born since the end of the war in 1975. In Hanoi, the executives met with Ford, Vietnam to discuss Ford’s experiences in developing their production facilities in the North. Later the group met with Vietnam Shipping officials to discuss logistics and attended a dinner with business and finance students at Hanoi Foreign Language University. The next day the group met with a State Owned Enterprise (SOE) involved in vehicle assembly and automotive spare parts fabrication to discuss how the equalization of these companies is progressing and how State owned companies are dealing with the highly competitive market. Later the executives met with a government think tank that advises the government on economic structural reform and then received a highly impressive presentation by Madame Chi Lan, Former Vice-President of the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI) and currently an Advisor to the Prime Minister's office in expanding the role of private industry in Vietnam and with U.S. Embassy officials to discuss recent market development. The last day involved work on group projects, a visit to an industrial estate and a final meeting with MBA students at the Hanoi Foreign Language University.
In the two-weeks, our students felt that we had exposed them to much of the changing scene of China and Vietnam. All felt that they had learned great deal but had come away from the trip with more questions than when they started out and more factors to weigh up in coming to grips with doing business in Asia. (
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