On the evening of May 28^th, co-hosted by the Marketing and Communication office with Alumni Office of the School of Economics and Management of Tongji University, and assisted by the German Alumni Association and the British Alumni Association of Tongji University, the “Cloud” Wisdom Gathering Forum of Alumni – Digital Technologies Promoting the Innovation and Development of International Enterprises was successfully held.

Our speakers, outstanding alumni from China, Germany and UK, gathered online, bringing a knowledge feast featuring wisdom and thought confrontation for more than 100 listeners. The event is also a gift from the School of Economics and Management for the 113^th anniversary of Tongji University.

For more details:

The event officially started after a brief and powerful opening speech given by Mr. Cheng Guoping, Dean Assistant of the School of Economics and Management. Professor Xie En, Deputy Dean of the School of Economics and Management, served as the host of the event. Professor Shi Qian, Deputy Secretary of CPC (in charge of work) and Vice President of the school, addressed the event.

In the address, Professor Shi noted:

“Today, global economy is in recession; China’s economy is also facing great pressure. In this circumstance, how to break the situation needs to be considered. At the just concluded NPC and CPPCC National meetings, President Xi Jinping pointed out the direction of future economic development. Once again, he emphasized the importance of vigorously promoting technological innovation and accelerating the development of strategic emerging industries such as digital economy and intelligent manufacturing.

The theme of today’s lecture is very in line with the practical needs. The three alumni invited have both international vision and local experience. They not only witnessed the digital wave, but also experienced and participated in it. The three alumni have profound insight into the digital development and future application trend of their fields, and have accumulated rich practical experience. I believe their sharing tonight will certainly inspire and benefit you.”

Dr. Hong Zhong

Executive Director of Sino-German Science and Education Park, Heidelberg, Germany

Data becomes a new raw material for chemical products.

The first speaker, Dr. Hong Zhong, is now the Executive Director of Sino-German Science and Education Park in Heidelberg, Germany. He studied in Germany for many years after learning from Professor Jiang Jingbo, former President of Tongji University. Dr. Hong Zhong was once Global Senior Vice President and Chief IT Architect of Evonik Industries AG. He led the formulation of the group’s digital development program.

In the keynote speech of “Digital Transformation Leading the Innovation and Transformation of International Chemical Enterprises”, Dr. Hong Zhong took the case of Evonik, an international chemical enterprise, as the starting point, elaborating how traditional enterprises achieved digital transformation in detail. Dr. Hong Zhong stressed that traditional enterprises, limited by the “burden” of their main business, face more difficulties in the process of digital transformation than those start-ups without any “burdens”. However, once traditional enterprises achieved digital transformation, they can use it as a powerhouse and new growth driver for enterprises.

“Evonik Industries AG provides special chicken feed methionine for chicken farms. In order to accurately grasp the feed consumption amount required by chicken farms, the group has established a special digital platform with various data provided farms. The platform can deliver feed accurately according to the scale of the farms, the growth cycle of chickens and recent weather changes. With the accumulation of various data, the platform has gradually become one of the important business revenue sources of Evonik Industries AG.”

The successful digital transformation of Evonik Industries AG has “turned data into new raw materials for chemical products”, thus changing the development direction of the industry.

Dr. Hong also looked back at the origin and nature of industry 4.0 and the wave of digitization. He pointed out that technological revolution constantly triggered the upgrading of the industry, making the whole human society always in dynamic adjustments. Nowadays, the digital wave has swept every field of our life. The emerging new things are challenging people’s old beliefs, reshaping people’s perception of the existing world, and also greatly affecting people’s imagination of the future world.

Dr. Wu Yijiang

Innovation Department of Cisco Systems, UK

Director of Innovation Insight

The pragmatism tendency of the British innovation system

The second speaker, Dr. Wu Yijiang, is a Bachelor of Engineering from Tongji University, and a Master of Engineering, a Doctor and Post Doctorate of Management from Imperial College London. Dr. Wu is currently the Director of Innovation Insight of the Innovation Department of Cisco Systems, a global leading network solution provider. With over 15 years of working experience in the UK, Dr. Wu has been at the forefront of the digital wave and has been deeply involved in many aspects of the scientific and technological innovation of the UK.

Dr. Wu first introduced the management framework of research and innovation of the UK, as well as the industry strategy funds of 22 vertical markets in the UK. Closely related to people’s lives, these funds provide specific policy guidance and financial support for UK’s scientific and technological innovation. For example, smart provision for the aged in the health sector – how to increase the average life span of the British people by five years by 2050; automatic driving technology – the British government and enterprises jointly released the 2030 Road Map of Automatic Driving Industry, so as to popularize of automatic driving technology in people’s future daily life.

Dr. Wu Yijiang pointed out that the reason why British high-tech innovation companies can “blossom” in many fields is that the country emphasizes innovation, embraces changes, and provides an open and transparent environment on both the institutional and financial levels to promote vigorous development of innovation, giving full play to its potential. Later, Dr. Wu introduced five representative scientific and technological innovation projects in the UK, and specifically explained the “pragmatism” tendency of the British innovation system; Whether it can solve practical problems and bring about a better future for mankind is the most important wind vane.

Finally, Dr. Wu launched the ONE4CITY one-stop smart city solution integrated portal website to strengthen Sino-British scientific and technological innovation cooperation. Based on the massive database of emerging science and technology solutions in the UK, ONE4CITY systematically presents the solutions, technologies and modes of British scientific and technological innovation under the framework of future cities, serving as an index and guideline in the current Sino-British cooperation in the field of scientific and technological innovation. Recently, ONE4CITY has been appointed by the European Institute for Innovation and Technology to conduct systematic research on the application and business models of AI solutions across Europe.

Mr. Pan Xiaozhen

President of GOLDENHOME

GOLDENHOME is “armed to teeth with informatization”.

The third speaker Mr. Pan Xiaozhen, an undergraduate student majoring in architectural management in Tongji University, founded GOLDENHOME from scratch after graduation. With over 20 years of development, GOLDENHOME is now a professional service provider of domestic high-end integrated cabinets and customized furniture, and was successfully listed on the A-share main board on May 12^th, 2017.

While telling the story of the digital GOLDENHOME, Pan Xiaozhen stressed that due to the natural customized gene in the cabinet or home furnishing industry, the GOLDENHOME can be regarded as “half an Internet enterprise” from the very beginning. In the era of manual workshop, customization purely depends on experienced masters. When it comes to large-scale production, customization depends on digitization completely. Therefore, for its own survival and development, GOLDENHOME have “armed itself to the teeth with informatization”. Since the launch of the industry’s first “industrial flexible customization system”, GOLDENHOME have established a big data analysis system, GIS design system, agile supply chain system, workshop numerical control system, mobile service scheduling system and GIS ecosystem of data acquisition.

Based on China and looking at the world, Mr. Pan said frankly that compared with customized home furnishing enterprises in the United States and Germany, GOLDENHOME needs to catch up with them in terms of IT and industrialized equipment, but the company is in a leading position when it comes to the “integration of informatization and industrialization”.

As a local entrepreneur, Mr. Pan hopes that GOLDENHOME can contribute golden wisdom and Chinese wisdom to the digital transformation of China’s and even the world’s home furnishing industry during its process of digital transformation.

The sharing of the guests inspired the enthusiasm of the audience. Here are the highlights of the Q&A.

-Dr. Hong Zhong-

Q：What can China learn from German industry 4.0?

A: As we all know, China is a big manufacturing country, while Germany is major manufacturing power. The advantages of German manufacturing lie not only in technology, but also in the stability of its technology. For example, they can ensure that no matter who the cook is and whether he is good at cooking or not, their instant food products tastes almost the same. In this way, they can ensure the stability of technologies, which is worth learning for our manufacturing industry.

-Dr. Wu Yijiang-

Q: While building a smart city, how did Britain manage to achieve data sharing and public privacy protection at the same time?

A: First, by policy. GDPR has strict and meticulous regulations on the processing of personal data. There are certain boundaries for organizations or institutions which want to obtain or use the personal data it holds. Once the boundary is crossed, the punishment is quite serious. Second, by culture. Most British people attach great importance to privacy and will do whatever they can to protect their privacy and personal data.

-Mr. Pan Xiaozhen-

Q: In the process of GOLDENHOME’s digital transformation, do traditional management ideas such as lean production still have value?

A: Nowadays, the home furnishing industry attaches great importance to informatization and smart technologies, which is indeed a good way to upgrade technologies. However, the essence of the home furnishing industry is still a manufacturing industry. Core elements such as continuous improvement and lean production will not change and should not change. For GOLDENHOME, both informatization and lean production should be given enough attention to and cannot be ignored.

we are oceans apart,

but connected is our heart.

On the occasion of 113^th anniversary of Tongji University,

Tongji SEM Alumni Association will hold a cloud gathering

to pool the wisdom and share new insights.

Will China be the leader of digital economy?

How did overseas multinationals innovate and develop strategically?

What can Chinese businesses learn from those multinationals?

How can traditional manufacturing industry empower enterprises through digital transformation?

The sudden outbreak of COVID-19 has made “going online and moving to the cloud” a common consensus among all industries. To be digitalized, the manufacturing industry moves faster than others, actively exploring strategies and technical patterns. Faced with such a big idea as digital empowerment, many businesses and even the whole industry are “learning while doing”. To make less mistakes, it’s better for Chinese companies to learn from experienced counterparts or discuss with experts who know well strategies and technical patterns of advanced economies.

Focusing digital empowerment and international enterprise innovation, participants of this online session on May 28 will discuss the global landscape of digital economy, Britain and Germany’s experiences and domestic traditional businesses’ practices to transform themselves through digitalization. Prof. SHI Qian, Deputy Dean and Deputy Party Secretary of Tongji SEM will be invited to address this session and Deputy Dean Prof. XIE En will be the moderator. Three outstanding alumni giving keynote speeches include Dr. Hong Zhong, executive director of Sino-German Science and Education Park in Heidelberg, Dr. Wu Yijiang, Director of Innovation Insight in the UK Innovation Department of Cisco, and Mr. Pan Xiaozhen, president and founder of GOLDENHOME.

DATE/TIME

May 28, 2020 7:00 PM (Beijing Time)

HOW TO ATTEND

ZOOM

Meeting ID：939 872 89874

Passcode：404190

Long press and scan the QR code

To open Zoom

LIVESTREAMING SCHEDULE

KEYNOTE SPEAKERS

HONG Zhong

CEO of the Sino-German Science and Education Park in Heidelberg

In 1987, he was admitted to the doctoral degree of Professor JIANG Jingbo, then furthered his studies in Germany and obtained a doctorate in economics from the University of Giessen. He was president of the German Alumni Association of Tongji University and president of the Economics Association of Chinese Scholars and Students in Germany.

From 2015 to 2019, he worked as senior vice president and IT chief architect of Evonik Industries AG, and presided over the formulation of the group’s digital development plan.

WU Yijiang

Director of Innovation Insight in the UK Innovation Department of Cisco

Bachelor of Engineering of Tongji University

Master of Engineering, Doctor of Management, and Post Doctorate of Imperial College London

President of the Alumni Association of Tongji University in Britain

During his stay in the UK, his team won dozens of British government innovation funds and the Newton Fund in China for scientific and technological innovation projects. The achievements covered technological R&D integration, integrated management and application in the market. In addition, he works as a tutor for master’s and MBA programs in many British universities and is also the founder of ONE4CITY one-stop smart city solution.

PAN Xiaozhen

Founder of GOLDENHOME

1989 alumni of Construction Management

Alumni councilor of Tongji SEM

He successively won the titles of “Influential Figure of Fujian Cabinet Industrial Association “, “Influential Figure of Chinese Cabinet Industry “, “Contributors in Xiamen Business Community at the 30th Anniversary of Xiamen Special Economic Zone”, and “2017 China’s Top Ten Figures in Household Industry “. The GKC pioneered in the industry and created the “Industrial Flexible Custom-built System”. It was the first Chinese enterprise to use modern information technology to transform the traditional furniture manufacturing industry and was awarded the title of “Leading National Enterprise in Intelligent Manufacturing “.

Attending Official

Prof. Shi Qian

Deputy Dean and Deputy Party Secretary of Tongji SEM

Moderator

Prof. Xie En

Deputy Dean of Tongji SEM

On behalf of the School and the Alumni Entrepreneur Association, Wu Boning, Liu Chunsong and Zhang Ping addressed the event respectively, encouraging entrepreneurs to make use of the platform of Tongji SEM to communicate and exchange ideas as much as possible in the future, so as to help each other and make progress hand in hand on the way of starting businesses.

During the event, five outstanding female entrepreneurs, including Long Fengming, MBA alumna from the class of 2013, founder& CEO of Jiangsu Yiminei Enterprise Management Co., Ltd. and Shanghai Eminent Enterprise Management Co., Ltd., founder& CMO of Jiangsu Briln Environmental Protection Technology Co., Ltd., President of EMN Business School of Enterprise Management, and President of ETC Excellent Training Club; Shi Wen, MBA alumna from the class of 2012, founder &CEO of Suzhou Shishi Jewelry Co., Ltd. and founder of Pearl Girl brand; Xu Aiyi, MBA alumna from the class of 2017, General Manager of Shanghai Yiru Industrial Co., Ltd. and partner of Midao Craft Beer; Zhu Bingxuan, MBA alumna from the class of 2015 and founder of Ruochong Education Technology Co., Ltd. as well as Deng Jingjing, MBA alumna from the class of 2018, Chairman of Shanghai Yingxi E-commerce Co., Ltd., and Secretary General of Wuhe (Shanghai) Economic and Cultural Promotion Association, delivered wonderful keynote speeches.

Long Fengming: From Being Forced to Drop out of School to Start Businesses- How I Changed My Own Life

Shi Wen: A CEO without Knowledge of Sales is not a Good Entrepreneur

Xu Aiyi: Numerous Possibilities of Overseas Business Opportunities-The Stories of Me, Tongji University and Germany

Zhu Bingxuan: Using over 10,000 Cases to Share Experience with You on Children’s Education

Deng Jingjing: “Internet plus” New Retail

The alumni shared their entrepreneurial stories, experiences and lessons learned along the way, discussing the choices, challenges, advantages and risks faced by female entrepreneurs from various perspectives.

During the round table discussion, the last part of the event, five alumni exchanged ideas with the audience. The participants posed questions actively, bringing the atmosphere to a climax. Finally, all participants took a group photo together, marking the end of the event.

(provided by the Alumni and Corporate Relations Office)

(provided by the Alumni and Corporate Relations Office)

Professor Shen delivered a speech at the event. He thanked the alumni for coming from all over the country to attend the meeting, noting that the Alumni Association could not exist without the support and help of the alumni. He also expressed his sincere gratitude to the alumni tutors and judges who have worked hard in the reviewing process. Lei Xinghui introduced the development of alumni work of Tongji University, and thanked all alumni for their devotion to the alma mater and their supervision for the students. Shi Qian introduced the current development and achievements of Tongji SEM, and expressed his gratitude to the alumni for their support for the development of the school. Shi Derong thanked all the alumni presented. As representatives of Shen Rongfang Alumni Association, Luo Jiaming and Fan Bonai gave a speech respectively.

The representative of the award-winning students also delivered a speech, saying that they would adhere to the spirit of “helping and standing with each other”, working harder in their future study and life.

The event ended successfully in a warm atmosphere. The guests speakers said they hope that Shen Rongfang scholarship would continue to be inherited and enriched, contributing to the “Double First-class” construction and discipline development of Tongji University.

(provided by the Alumni and Corporate Relations Office)

Brief Introduction of Tongji University Shen Rongfang Scholarship

Mr. Shen is the forerunner of operational research of China’s engineering universities and the chief editor of Operational Research, a textbook for Chinese university students. He once served as the Director of the Department of Management Engineering, Dean of the SEM, Deputy Director of Shanghai Disaster Prevention and Relief Institute and the Director of System Engineering Research Office. Mr. Shen is also the Deputy Director (for three consecutive terms) of the Supervisory Committee of Management Science and Engineering Majors of the State Education Commission (now the Ministry of Education of the State Council) and a member of the evaluation group of management discipline of the Academic Degrees Committee of the State Council (the third term). He served as the first Chairman of the Board of Directors of Chinese Ergonomics Society and the first Chinese director of the Board of Directors of the International Ergonomics Association.

“Tongji University Shen Rongfang Scholarship” is established by Shen Rongfang and his alumni in response to the call of the CPC, the University and the School, striving to do their best for the construction of “double first-class” and contribute to the cultivation of talents. Students receiving the scholarship are excellent both morally and academically, love public welfare and have a high sense of social responsibility. Meanwhile, the scholarship invites Shen Rongfang’s alumni as well as people who are keen on the cause of scholarship to serve as off-campus tutors. The tutors are all top-notch talents from different walks of life. Cooperating with the University, they will guide and help our students to cultivate top talents.

Dr. Lu Feng delivered a speech entitled “Internationalization of Chinese Enterprises: Motivation, Challenge, Trend and Opportunity”. He described the different management methods, legal frameworks and employee mindsets of Chinese and European enterprises, making in-depth discussions with participants on the models and choices of internationalization, the reasons for internationalization and some problems encountered by Chinese enterprises in this process.

Dr. Zhong Mo delivered a speech entitled “Globalization of Chinese Enterprises: Global Layout and Empirical M&A Cases”. He introduced two cases of Chinese enterprises going global in detail, shared a series of issues that need to be considered during the negotiation of overseas M&A as well as its implication, and emphasized the key role of decision makers in the process of internationalization.

Zhang Fuqiang made a speech entitled “Practice and Thoughts on China-Myanmar Beef Cattle Industry Investment in the Belt and Road Initiative”. Taking the imported Burmese beef cattle as an example, he introduced the role of investment and development along the Belt and Road in solving China’s supply shortage, the solution for Chinese market connecting with overseas resources as well as the realistic problems for Chinese investors, such as risks posed by the management and limitations of opening up and decision-making in countries along the Belt and Road.

At the end of the forum, speaking from their own experiences, three alumni shared their opinions about learning and practice with the student audience. While encouraging them to participate in practical activities, the alumni also noted that only by strengthening theoretical foundation in class can we achieve long-term career development.

The “empirical knowledge” of the three alumni provided a lot of useful information for the participants. Student audience said that they hope there would be more opportunities to participate in such events and have more in-depth exchanges with the alumni in the future.

(provided by the Alumni and Corporate Relations Office)

(provided by the Alumni and Corporate Relations Office)

(provided by the Alumni and Corporate Relations Office)

(Text provided by the Alumni and Corporation Relations Office)

(Text provided by the Alumni and Corporation Relations Office)