Issue 5 - July 2016

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Welcome to the fifth edition of CityU MBA newsletter. In this issue, we are excited to share news about the CityU MBA programme and how our elite students and alumni are demonstrating leadership in their profession – which is a core value that CityU is striving to achieve for our students. The highlight of this issue is the Global Brand Management Workshop at Imperial College London, which was successfully held in March this year. We also present a series of events and activities organised by the MBA programme team, as well as by our fellow students and alumni. Please enjoy the CityU MBA newsletter and we look forward to hear your feedback via email mba@cityu.edu.hk.

In this Issue

1. The Global Brand Management Workshop at Imperial College London

2. MBA Signature Seminar: “Xiaomi Way”

3. MBA Professional Forum Series- China Outlook: Political, Economic, Environmental

& Geopolitics

- American Firm Doing Business in China

4. Global Talent Recruitment

5. Alumni Connect- CityU MBA Badminton Doubles Tournament

- Prospective Students meeting the Alumni

- 2013 Cohort MBA Alumni Reunion Dinner

- Sharing is Caring: School-Company-Parent

Programme

6. Alumni Corner- Mr Julius Koehler

- Mr Vincent Yau

- Miss Christina Qian

CityU MBA Newsletter Issue 5

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The Global Brand Management Workshop atImperial College London

CityU MBA programme team is proudly introducing the brand-new Study Tour, and this time we are in London for the Global Brand Management Workshop. This workshop is carried out at the Imperial College Business School, a world’s top-ten ranked university right in the heart of London. With a group of 30 elite MBA students led by Professor Kevin Chiang, the Director of CityU MBA programme, coached their experiential learning journey from mid-March 2016. During this exciting trip, they have attended a series of lectures delivered by some of the renowned Business professors in the world, and together with several international enterprise visits to meet with industry leaders and networking event with their MBA students at Imperial College.

As a part of the CityU MBA Experiential Learning exercise, this new trip provides practical learning-by-doing activities and lectures with the focuses on the fundamentals of branding, brand innovation, and key aspects on managing strong brands in a global perspective.

The trip was kick-started by Dr. Omar Merlo, the Programme Director of MSc Strategic Marketing and Professor at Imperial College and also the Fellow at University of Cambridge. He delivered a fascinating lecture on “Fundamentals of Branding: Building, Managing and Ensuring Brand Equity”. Another renowned Professor of Marketing at Imperial College, Professor Andreas Eisingerich discussed about the key issues on Brand Leveraging: Managing Opportunities for Brand Growth and Strengthening. Dr. Simon Nyeck, the Academic Director of MBA International Luxury Brand Management at ESSEC Business School, one of the Top 3 European Schools according to Financial Times for Masters in Management (Ranking 2015), he was specially invited from France to deliver a keynote lecture on “Fundamentals of Branding: Luxury Markets” to the students.

Lectures with World-class Professors in Brand Management

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In addition to the academic lectures, a unique experiential learning session in the Impact Lab™ on Service Design and Brand Innovation was arranged for our students at the Royal College of Art. Dr. Nick de Leon, Head of Service Design at the College and Director of Design London, led the students through the learning-by-doing method to laboratory-based discoveries and inspired them with the most innovative frameworks to transform an original idea into a real, prototype-based business proposition.

Intersection of Innovation, Design and Technology at Impact Lab™, Royal College of Art

Several industry speakers were particularly invited to share their insights and practical experiences in brand management. Mark Radda, a brand and communication strategist who led the brand strategy for London 2012 Olympic Games and other organizations, provided real-life case studies and discussed “Building and Managing Strong Brands” together with our MBA students. Leaders from various industries: FMCG, luxury products, airlines to global marketing agencies also explored other hot issues in brand management, such as “Fundamentals of Branding: Luxury Markets”, “Why Success in Marketing is increasingly about Trust and Simplicity”, “How to Differentiate the Undifferentiated” and “From Brands to Brand Experience”, all of these exciting addresses were highly appreciated by our students.

Lessons with Influential Industry Experts

To strengthen the practical linkages between theoretical materials from the classroom and real cases in workplace, some of the global companies were selected for students to visit during their stay in London. For instance, BMW MINI Plant tour was organised for the students to gain insights into the automobile production industry by observing their assembly plants of Mini Cooper cars, as well as to learn more about the British cultures and designs. The students also paid a visit to SABMiller plc, one of the largest beer brewers in the world. Mr. Eoin Cannon, the Global Learning and Development Manager at SABMiller, shared his visions and market trend insights in their creative marketing campaigns, which helps our students in grasping the essence of building global brands, ensuring our MBA students are well prepare for global challenges.

To further extend the concepts of creating and managing commercial brand values, they have paid a company visit to a leading Europe financial services provider based in Santander UK, famed for its sports sponsorships in the McLaren Formula One team and British Grand Prix. With the increasing importance of digital economy and its impacts to brands management, be able to maximise branding opportunities in the digital age is of vital importance for a global brand to grow further. During the company visit at iCrossing a subsidy of Hearst Corporation, which is a global digital marketing agency owned by an American multinational conglomerate group, our students have learned how to employ digital marketing tools for branding exercises through presentations and discussions with their digital marketing specialists.

Enterprise Visits to meet with Industry Leaders

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The trip offers not only a great opportunity for our CityU MBA students to learn more about the contemporary issues in brand management through lectures and company visits, but also an excellent opportunity to establish important work contacts for future business and personal endeavours, networking events with the Imperial College MBA students were also held during the trip.

The programme was well-perceived by the CityU MBA students who enjoyed the most in their learning experience at Imperial College. The invaluable sharing of the programme professors, industry speakers and Imperial MBA students were greatly appreciated, thanks to the MBA team in organizing all of these prestigious visits and events that helps our students to accelerate their industrial engagements and more importantly, global visions for years to come.

Social Event with International MBA students

Benefits from important sharing together with renowned professors at Imperial College Business School and hands on experience at the Impact Lab™ at The Royal College of Arts.

Grasp the contemporary issues, which are of strategically important in Brand Management shared by many industry leaders.

International enterprise visits to strengthen the linkage between the branding theories in classroom and the practical cases in workplace.

Social event: Important networking opportunity provided to allow closer interactions with Imperial Colleague MBA students and to establish contacts for future business and personal endeavours.

Global Brand Management Workshop Highlights

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MBA Signature Seminar: “Xiaomi Way”

Mr. KK Wong, the Co-founder and Vice President of Xiaomi Technology visited the College of Business at CityU on April 16, 2016. Jointly offered by CityU MBA and MBA Alumni Association (CityU MBAAA), Mr. Wong has delivered an interactive and sensational seminar to MBA students and alumni by showing us how the “Xiaomi Way” would lead to success in the path of entrepreneurship.

Xiaomi is renowned for its design and creation as well as sales strategies of innovative smart technologies, especially the famous Xiaomi smartphones. However, Mr. Wong stated that they position Xiaomi as an Internet Company, not a hardware manufacturer, and they run their business like the way an Internet Company do. Mr. Wong shared the core values of “Xiaomi Way”: Convergence “專注” > Supreme “極致” > Instantaneous “快” > Word of Mouth “口碑” < Engagement “參與” < Being Friends with Users “和用戶做朋友” < Socialised Mass Communication “社會化媒體傳播”. In contrast with traditional cellphone makers, Xiaomi did not use a wide portfolio of phone models to compete for its market share, but concentrated on all their efforts into making one “Explosive product 爆品” – a hit product that surprises the market with halved the price of their rival companies and producing surpassing quality in their products. The Mi Phone was successfully launched in 2011 with more than 70 million units sold globally in 2015.

Many people are intrigued by how Xiaomi was able to achieve such successful results in such short period of time. Mr. Wong addressed our audience that it was all about the “Xiaomi Way”: 1. Building products in an internet way: other than good smart hardware, a good android mobile operating system – the MIUI operating system was strategically developed to attract younger users to Xiaomi’s community. 2. Marketing products in an internet way by using creative digital marketing strategies through social media to replace high-cost traditional advertising campaigns which is now considered less effective in the modern digital age. 3. Being friends with fans in an internet way through social media by outreaching their loyal users in their Xiaomi forum platform. Encouraging their Xiaomi loyal users to engage in the process of designing the next generation of Xiaomi products. 4. Direct selling products to users through Xiaomi’s own online

Meet with KK Wong, Co-founder of Xiaomi

Graduated from the Purdue University in Computer Science, Mr. Wong has spent 14 years in Microsoft since 1997. He built the data analysis system and workflow system of BizTalk in Seattle, and then he was responsible for the instant messaging and other applications in Windows Mobile and Windows Phone 7

platforms in Microsoft China ever since. In 2010, Mr. Wong co-founded Xiaomi with Mr. Lei-Jun, the CEO of Xiaomi and other partners. Now Mr. Wong is mainly responsible for the Cloud platform technology development, Mi Router and the IOT (Internet-of-Things) platform products offered by Xiaomi.

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online shopping platform and other related e-commerce platforms to lower the cost in logistics and inventory that would ultimately lower the cost of their products, and therefore better customer satisfaction and values created. 5. Frequent and instantaneous online response to Xiaomi fans so as to increase users’ engagement and satisfaction.

Mr. Wong also pointed out that enterprise would succeed if a strong corporate image and positive word of mouth were created. He also believed that the moment when selling their final product is actually just the beginning of their job. Like a cycle, the super compelling services and good user experience delivered by the enterprise will certainly attract existing and potential users to consider purchasing their products.

At the end of the seminar, Mr. Wong was delighted to answer questions raised by a large number of audiences. One of the audiences mentioned that Xiaomi has many different products: Mi TV, Mi Router, Mi Box, Mi Rice-cooker, etc., it has a wide variety of product categories seems to be contradicted to Xiaomi’s convergent principle in product development. In fact, it is an evidence to show the important role of Mi fans’ engagement in product design. The newly added products were inspired by Mi fans during the promotion period of previous products like Mi Phone and Mi Router. From all these facts shared by Mr. Wong, we were able to learn more about the Xiaomi way. Mr. Wong finally concluded the seminar with Xiaomi’s mission: We aim to bring fun and high-tech innovation that everyone can enjoy the most.

To make the seminar more interactive, CityU MBAAA specially arranged an online Q & A game and received many participants to engage. Audience simply replied questions about Xiaomi Company on their smartphones and all scores went to online display instantly. Mr. Wong awarded Xiaomi products as winner prizes to the 3 participants receiving the highest scores.

Xiaomi was co-founded in 2010 by the serial entrepreneur Mr. Lei Jun, who believes that high-quality technology doesn't need to cost a fortune. At Xiaomi, smart people were brought together from Google, Kingsoft, Microsoft, Motorola, Yahoo, and other Internet and technology enterprises from around the world to bring together that vision to life. Xiaomi created remarkable hardware, software, and Internet services for, and with the involvement of their Mi fans. Feedbacks were incorporated from fans into Xiaomi’s product range, they are Mi 4, Mi 3, Mi Pad, Mi Box, Mi TV, Redmi 1S and Redmi Note, and Mi Power Bank just to name a few.. More than 18 million handsets were sold in China in 2013 and new products were launched in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia, Philippines, India and Indonesia.

About Xiaomi

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MBA Professional Forum Series

Mr Andrew Yao, Executive Director and CEO of Hong Kong Shanghai Alliance Holdings Limited and Hong Kong Deputy to the 12th National People’s Congress (NPC) of China spent an evening at CityU Campus to discuss with MBA students his view on the China Outlook covering the areas of Political, Economic, Environmental & Geopolitics.

China Outlook: Political, Economic, Environmental & GeopoliticsMr Andrew Yao (22 February 2016)

Graduated with the Bachelor Degree in Science at UC Berkeley, followed by the MBA at Harvard, Mr Yao decided to extend his business in infrastructure and property development in Mainland China back in 2002. Based on the experience he gained from a business trip in Tianjin, he considered the critical success factors lead to his business success is that he needs “to feel and breathe the local air” and it really implies to experiencing and learning the local culture, learn the difference, and explore new opportunities strategically. Mr Yau has shared and discussed with MBA students in multiple occasions, not only on his extensive experience in the field, but also his views about China including its political dimensions, GDP growth, the 2016 13th year plan and the latest national focus on “One Belt One Road”.

The evening was a great opportunity for MBA students, not just to learn more about China but also be inspired by a top executive like Mr Andrew Yao himeself, who has over two decades of industrial experience in the infrastructure and property development field in Mainland China.

American Firm Doing Business in ChinaMr Wilfred Yiu (14 April 2016)

Mr. Wilfred Yiu, the Deputy Chief Executive Officer and Chief Operating Officer of the Beijing Gao Hua Securities, visited CityU on the 14th April, 2016 and spent a meaningful evening with our CityU MBA students on the topic of “American firm doing business in China”. Mr. Yiu has been working in American banking industry for more than two decades. As one of the key representatives in a world-class American investment bank, he shared his experience and vision on how American business could be successful in the greater China region.

Mr. Yiu thought that people from American company are usually more upfront in expressing one’s opinions and aggressive in achieving goals, and this is a big contrast to Chinese culture that Chinese are generally more humble and not willing to show their true thoughts easily. He also noted that the priority in business-decisions making, Americans tended to put legal concerns ( 法 Fă ) in the first place, then logical reasoning ( 理 Lĭ ) and relationships ( 情 Qíng ) comes later; while a reverse order was more common to be seen in the Chinese business community when compared with the American ways of dealing in business. When it comes to business communication, he suggested students should consider the differences between the two cultures, and to strategically tailor the content of the messages as well as how the message to be presented to accommodate different target audiences, this would increase the likelihood of successful handling in both the Chinese business community and the American market.

Mr. Yiu also shared his experience in 2008 Global Financial Crisis, one of the biggest financial crisis in global history and some of his personal reflections shared. He truly believed that optimism can help to bring you through all crisis, and he motivated the students do not easily give up too early when facing difficult challenges, once you break through the obstacle, you will reach another higher level of skills in all aspects.

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Global Talent RecruitmentThe season in attracting and recruiting the highest quality students and professionals into the CityU MBA Programme to cohort 2016 has commenced. Various recruitment activities and events were organised on and off campus and have attracted a high volume of prospective students with strong interests to our programme. The recruitment period is approaching the end with new cohort of 2016 starting from September, recommendation from alumni and current students are encouraged.

CityU MBA Badminton Doubles Tournament (April 2016)The CityU MBA Badminton Doubles Tournament on 24 April, 2016 organised by the MBA Sports Club was successfully held on campus. A group of CityU MBA students and alumni joined this exciting mixed doubles tournament. What makes the tournament most exciting was the player pairings were drew on the tournament day. The players were required to state their self-assessed levels whether they were advanced players, intermediate players, or beginners in advance. By drawing and pairing high and low level players together, MBA

Alumni Connect

Prospective Students meeting the Alumni (April 2016)A warm and cozy alumni and prospective students gathering session was held in Shenzhen at UNI-Cup Specialty Coffee Café. UNI-CUP Specialty Coffee Café is founded by a CityU Alumna, Miss Tanya Tang. Thanks to alumni who have joined us on the day and shared their valuable learning experience with prospective students. A very special thanks goes to our alumna Tanya for her hospitality during our visit.

students and alumni were mixed in different teams. Through the memorable and amazing matches, all participants enjoyed the time being together very much.

Your participation in MBA Student Clubs activities is meaningful and is crucial for your well-being and personal network development. We hope all our MBA students, alumni and friends can enjoy our recreational events.

For more information about MBA Student Clubs, please visit:https://www.cb.cityu.edu.hk/mba/people/student_clubs/

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2013 Cohort MBA Alumni Reunion Dinner (April 2016)

MBA alumni of Cohort 2013 returned to CityU for a reunion dinner on Saturday, 16 April 2016. Joined together with Professor Kevin Chiang, MBA Director, Professor William Wan, Associate Dean of the College of Business and Dr YC Chan, Adjunct Professor of the Department of Management Science, participants gathered together to strengthen connections throughout the CityU MBA community. Alumni engagement and outreach is one of the key success factors in our programme. We hope to have your continuous support and look forward to seeing you again at our next reunion.

Sharing is Caring: School-Company-Parent Programme (April and May 2016)A group of CityU MBA students and alumni have voluntarily participated The School-Company-Parent programme hosted by The Young Entrepreneurs Development Council (YDC). The programme aims to help secondary students to establish better connections to the commercial sectors and prepare them with an entrepreneurial mindset, while enhancing parents' understanding of and communicating with their children. Under this programme, students participated in a series of workshops and one elective activity. Our MBA students and alumni have organised a number of workshops focusing on career planning and life goal setting for a delegated secondary school in Shatin. Apart from connecting a group of teenagers to real business world, the smart partnering programme with YDC created value for both the business and society simultaneously.

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“Immerse yourself in an intensive learning experience that will transform your approach to business and leadership – that is my personal MBA experience in short.” Julius said. “With past experience in the automotive industry as well as leading consultancies, I already had extensive business knowledge but wanted to get the 'pedigree' to go with my experience to enrich my career progression. The CityU MBA programme offered exactly this outcome and allowed me to broaden my global vision and network while studying with likeminded executives in one of the Top 3 Asian business college, strategically located at the heart of Asia.”

Julius has extensive work experience in various international luxury brands, automotive companies and strategic consultancies, including Hugo Boss, Daimler AG, Porsche, Roland Berger and McKinsey & Co. As an outstanding international CityU MBA student with significant work experience and outstanding job achievements, he was awarded the CityU MBA Elite Scholarship and the CityU MBA Diversity Contribution Scholarship when he was joining us in 2013. Julius has continued to play a proactive role in his study and has helped in MBA promotional campaign!

After his study in CityU, Julius has started his own business in 2014 and co-founded a mobile app, CatchUp which creates transparency over your friends’ travel plans. With the ever-growing globalization and the associated travelling, CatchUp allows friends to share itineraries and reconnect with friends across the world. In 2015, Julius has joined WATCHMARSTER.COM to be the Head of Sales and oversees 17 west European countries including, Germany, Switzerland, Netherlands and the UK.

CityU MBA is glad to share more success stories of our students. They are excellent interpretations of our slogan: “We are SHARP” - We are committed to fostering a business education environment with world class Software, state-of-the-art Hardware, and well connected Alumni so as to boost global talents Recruitment and power them to achieve a career advancing Placement.

Alumni Corner

Current Location: Berlin, Germany

Undergraduate: Bachelor of Business Studies and Marketing University of Stirling, Germany

Postgraduate: MBA, City University of Hong Kong

Current Position: Head of Sales, WATCHMASTER.COM

Mr Julius Koehler2013 Cohort

CityU MBA ads in Hong Kong International Airport and MTR stations with Julius’s participation.

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I am the Sales and Marketing Manager at Glorious Concrete (H.K.) Ltd. a subsidiary of Sun Hung Kai Properties Ltd. I was promoted to this position right after the completion of my MBA study. I have been working in the construction materials sector since 1999, a year after obtaining my bachelor degree in applied chemistry.

I have chosen CityU MBA not only because the learning experience gained through my undergraduate study, in fact, the combination of theoretical and practical learning approach attracts me the most. One thing I have to emphasis is that the faulty at the CityU College of Business are dedicated in articulating education into the practical world. They are highly qualified and possess extensive industry experience, often combining business backgrounds with academic excellence. Their teaching method is grounded in the realities of working in business, which are highly practical and it bridges the gap between theory and real world application.

I have formed many lasting friendships from my 2 year study and a diverse and inspiring group of people. I greatly enjoyed all the hours we spent working on group projects and the reward and recognition from getting the best result in the class though our collaborative efforts.

Completing a graduate degree is one of my greatest accomplishments considering the time management skill required to balance between life, work and study, but also how to apply what I have learnt to my day to day life.

Current Location: Hong Kong

Undergraduate: BSc Applied Chemistry, City University of Hong Kong

Postgraduate: MBA, City University of Hong Kong

Current Position: Sales & Marketing Manager, Glorious Concrete (H.K.) Ltd

Mr Vincent Yau2013 Cohort

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14/F, Academic 3,City University of Hong Kong

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After attaining an undergraduate degree in Shanghai Finance University and worked in different positions within a Fortune 500 FMCG company for certain number of years, I felt that I need to go deeper into developing leadership skills and gaining the confidence to move forward with my career. Studying CityU MBA more than fulfilled my expectations. The programme not only increased my academic knowledge in multiple business related fields, it has also broadened my perspectives in considering disruptive challenges and developed my skills and capabilities in finding better solutions.

Having the opportunities to meet with a variety of professional experts in conjunction with the design of the programme curriculum made my study really enjoyable. The study trip at UC Berkeley was an incredible learning experience. The lessons and perspectives on entrepreneurship and business development plan proved very insightful as it allowed immediate applicability of learned concepts.

During the MBA study, it was quite often to come across the topic of how to be an inspirational leader. I believe that future leaders must be equipped with global mindset and engaged in continuous learning process. Learning the unknown is not just about equipping knowledges and models in different areas, but also learning about yourself and others. In this context, the programme has given me strengths to grow and address critical challenges in the ever changing business world. I would say this can be best described in a Chinese phase “仰天长啸出门去，我辈岂是蓬蒿人”

Following the completion of CityU MBA in February 2016, I started working with Nielsen Hong Kong as the FMCG Retail Management Manager and am confident that my enthusiasm will enable me to make valuable impact on my career.

Current Location: Hong Kong

Undergraduate: Bachelor of Arts, Shanghai Finance University

Postgraduate: MBA, City University of Hong Kong

Current Position: FMCG Retail Management Manager at Nielsen (Hong Kong)

Miss Christina Qian2014 Cohort