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The second Annual Meeting of the New Champions will take place in Tianjin, People’s Republic of China, 25-27 September 2008

News from the Inaugural Annual Meeting of the New Champions:

Saturday 8 September 2007

Forum announced the creation of a Community of Global Growth Companies
Revealing a bold new initiative of the World Economic Forum Community, already comprised of the 1,000 foremost global enterprises, Klaus Schwab, Forum Founder and Executive Chairman, announced the creation of a new community of fast-growing companies destined to join the ranks of global multinationals in the next 5 to 10 years. "These are a very special group of companies that have not really been understood," said Schwab. At the closing of the Inaugural Annual Meeting of the New Champions in Dalian, he welcomed 125 founding members to the Community of Global Growth Companies.

Also closing the meeting, Dai Xianglong, Mayor of Tianjin, People's Republic of China, offered his thanks to the Forum for its selection of his city for the second Annual Meeting of the New Champions. That meeting will take place in Tianjin, People’s Republic of China on 25-27 September, 2008.
Press release I Community of Global Growth Companies I Photos I Webcast

Business and AIDS - from the first to the developing world
"Health is a human right and is the responsibility of the government but that doesn’t mean that business cannot get involved," said Rajat K. Gupta, Senior Partner, McKinsey & Co.; Chairman of the Board, The Global Fund; and World Economic Forum Foundation Board Member, as he made the case for private sector involvement in the fight against AIDS.

The pharmaceutical industry was represented at the session by Bo Shao, Chairman, NovaMed Pharmaceuticals, who said, "my industry has developing world clients but first world costs. To solve this problem we need a globalization of the pharmaceuticals industry."
Webcast I Session summary I Global Health Initiative

Growing a company in the networked world
“We need people who understand the local culture of a country,” said Maurice Lévy, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Publicis Group. To build a brand, he explained, it is essential to have a workforce thoroughly steeped in local thinking. Brand building may demand different strategies to create the same emotional resonance across cultures.

In a closely networked world, business leaders must figure out how best to weave local insights into their increasingly global operations, agreed panellists in this discussion on the networked world.
Webcast I Session summary

Friday 7 September 2007

New risk to growth highlighted
Retrenchment from globalization by the US public was identified as a serious and likely risk to global growth at the Inaugural Annual Meeting of the New Champions. "A backlash against globalization is a domestic political risk in the US and there is an increasingly strong protectionist movement in both political parties," said Nicholas Eberstadt, Chair in Political Economy, American Enterprise Institute.

Samuel DiPiazza Jr, CEO, PricewaterhouseCoopers, cited a recent report from the World Economic Forum, which has identified this same risk as becoming increasingly prominent in the collective consciousness of CEOs, he said, "If this happens it will be very, very serious for the global economy."
Webcast

"Table for Two" initiative simultaneously targets hunger and obesity
The World Economic Forum’s "Table for Two" initiative simultaneously targets hunger in the developing world and obesity in developed countries.
"Every time someone eats a healthy meal at participating company cafeterias, restaurants and events, 20 cents is donated to fund a healthy school meal in developing countries," said James Kondo, President and Vice-Chairman, Health Policy Institute in Japan and Young Global Leader. The aim is to spread the initiative worldwide.

With one billion people suffering from hunger and another billion suffering from obesity, the "Table for Two" initiative of the Young Global Leaders of the World Economic Forum aims to tackle both, at the same time.
Press release

New technology and new politics needed to defeat global warming 
“New technologies hold great promise for tackling climate change, but they need to be complemented by new political frameworks”, said Eileen Claussen, President, Pew Center on Global Climate Change. Claussen proposed that "the world needs a much more flexible framework, a framework that will be able to accommodate countries that are very different”. Lars G Josefsson, President and Chief Executive, Vattenfall, responded, "business is ready and has the know-how."  Josefsson cautioned, however, that government policies need to create market incentives as energy efficiency is ultimately an economic decision.
Press release I Webcast

Thursday 6 September 2007

Chinese Premier pledges “peaceful development”
Wen Jiabao, Premier of the People’s Republic of China, has pledged that “China will stay on the path of peaceful development.”

Speaking at the Inaugural Annual Meeting of the New Champions, Wen promised to continue reforms in key areas such as food and product safety, environmental safeguards and protection of intellectual property. Moreover, China will “build a harmonious society in all aspects” by deepening reform of the socialist market system, by speeding up development and social programmes, and by expanding what he labelled “people’s democracy.”
Press release I Webcast I Read the full address

Chinese Premier responds to World Economic Forum participants
On the opening day of the World Economic Forum’s Inaugural Annual Meeting of the New Champions in Dalian, Wen Jiabao, Premier of the People’s Republic of China, responded to questions from an audience of business and political leaders, and pledged that "China will stay on the path of peaceful development."

Wen promised to continue reforms in key areas such as food and product safety, environmental safeguards and protection of intellectual property. Moreover, China will "build a harmonious society in all aspects" by deepening reform of the socialist market system, by speeding up development and social programmes, and by expanding what he labelled "people’s democracy."
Press release I Photos I Webcast I Read the full address

Avoiding the backlash against the new investors
Neelie Kroes, Commissioner, European Community, Brussels began this session by disputing the ‘Doha is dead’ notion. “We are still negotiating, never give up before the final phase,” she said. All the important players need to be pushed to be more flexible, Kroes added. "We badly need a positive result to the Doha Round. It’s not too late."

Khalid Abdulla-Janahi, Chairman of the Executive Committee, Shamil Bank of Bahrain, Switzerland, talked about the gap between rhetoric and reality: "There is a lot of big talk about ‘come and invest in a developing market, but once you come in, God help you in terms of protectionism”.
Photos I Webcast I Session summary

Greater role for governments needed in technological development
Wan Gang, Minister of Science and Technology of the People’s Republic of China has argued for a greater role for the government in leading technological development in China. In a discussion on the Transformative Potential of Science and Technology in Dalian, Wan Gang said, “we need to have new models for development technology in this new society.”

Kiyoshi Kurokawa, Science Advisor to the Prime Minister’s Cabinet Office in Japan, added that the hard infrastructure provided by the government should also be matched by an equal enthusiasm for providing the soft infrastructure: human talent.
Photos I Webcast I Session summary

Forum and WHO to stimulate workplace health programmes
Experts and participants at the World Economic Forum’s Inaugural Annual Meeting of the New Champions in Dalian have focused on how to make better use of workplace wellness programmes in the first joint World Economic Forum and World Health Organization event.

Dr Catherine le Galès-Camus, Assistant Director-General of the World Health Organization said, "chronic disease prevention is an important part of the solution. Healthy diets, physical activity and tobacco control are being promoted by governments around the world and everyone has a role in prevention and control of chronic diseases. I am pleased to see that the commercial sector is examining chronic disease prevention through workplace initiatives.
Press release I Wellness Initiative

The rise of China’s stock exchanges
The recent growth of China’s capital markets was discussed by participants on the opening morning of the Inaugural Annual Meeting of the New Champions. “The policy remains the same for domestic companies to issue shares abroad. What has changed is the market,” said Shang Fulin, Chairman, China Securities Regulatory Commission. This confident outlook was confirmed by Fang Xinghai, Deputy Director-General, Office for Financial Services, Shanghai Municipal Government, who said, “we believe that in the future when big companies want to IPO, they will do so more and more in the domestic stock exchange.
Photos I Webcast

Participants arrive for the Inaugural Annual Meeting of the New Champions 
More than 1,700 participants from 90 countries, including Premier Wen Jiabao of China, are arriving in Dalian, China to take part in the Inaugural Annual Meeting of the New Champions, 6-8 September. The meeting will focus on the role the new generation of fast-emerging multinational companies – the New Champions – are playing in substantially changing the global business landscape.  
Press release: English & Chinese 

Quotes

"In this meeting, we were all bound together by the same spirit. The spirit of entrepreneurship and the spirit of social engagement."
Klaus Schwab, Founder and Executive Chairman, World Economic Forum

"For any New Champion that wants to build a long term brand, corporate social responsibility is essential."
Sir Martin Sorrell, Group Chief Executive, WPP

"The networked world is not about technology. It is also about people to people, people to information, people to business, and people to cultures."
Liu Jiren, Chairman and Chief Executive, Neusoft

"For the Olympic Games, the traffic problem in Beijing will probably be resolved but the air pollution issue is much more difficult."
David Li Daokui, Director, Center for China in the World Economy


 

"Social disparity and environmental problems are becoming more and more of a concern to the policy makers in China. They have more diversified goals now."
Fan Gang, Director, National Economic Research Institute, China Reform Foundation

"Although China's service sector is now over 40 percent of GDP, it is still not big enough to be a shock absorber if the US goes into a recession"
Qian Yingyi, Dean, Tsinghua University

"The government shouldn’t simply block the demand of citizens to buy cars. But we can set up a framework to encourage people to use smaller, more energy-efficient cars, perhaps by using different tax rates"
Zhang Xiaoqiang , Vice-Chairman, National Development and Reform Commission, People's Republic of China

"You can be new champions not only of commerce but of conciliation. Not only of trade but of tolerance. Not only of profit but of peace and understanding."
H.M. Queen Rania of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan
Read Her Majesty's address

 

"It’s worth reminding ourselves how much the world has benefited from the growth of free trade in the last two decades.Greater complexity reflects the success of the last 20 years, rather than failure today."
Kevan V. Watts, Vice-Chairman, Merrill Lynch & Co., Hong Kong SAR

“72% of America’s GDP is in consumer demand. It is not supported by income, but rather by equity from over-valued assets, such as property. This has come into focus with the recent sub-prime crisis.”
Stephen Roach, Chairman, Asia, Morgan Stanley, Hong Kong SAR

This summer Davos is very similar to the winter Davos but with the extra opportunity to show off the vitality and energy of the New Champions."
Wang Jianzhou, Chairman and CEO, China Mobile Communications Corporation, People’s Republic of China

"The key question is how do you put together a joint solution to the overheating of the Chinese economy and what’s going on in the rest of the world right now?"
William R. Rhodes, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer, CITI NA

"The Inaugural Annual Meeting of the New Champions will be an arena where the next generation of business leaders can meet, cooperate and exchange ideas."
Jeremy Jurgens, World Economic Forum Chief Representative in Beijing, Director of the Inaugural Annual Meeting of the New Champions

 In Dalian we will see a discussion that has not been had before. A discussion between established companies and their views of the world and the global growth companies with their perspective on what globalization really means.”
Ben J. Verwaayen, CEO, BT, United Kingdom

 
"We hope that the Inaugural Annual Meeting of the New Champions and subsequent meetings will help Global Growth Companies to share best practices so that they can catch up on important ingredients of success in the quickest way possible."
Victor Chu, CEO and Chairman of First Eastern Investment Group, Member of the Foundation Board of the World Economic Forum

"By moving from Davos to Dalian, the World Economic Forum underscores an explicit message that China has sent to the world - as one of the most influential emerging markets and driving engines of the world economy, China with its new champions has changed, is changing and will continue to change the global economic landscape."
Jiang Jianqing, Chairman, Industrial & Commercial Bank of China, Mentor at the Inaugural Annual Meeting of the New Champions