|
Background
As the global economy
braces itself for fundamental changes and international
markets continue with their correction, we see renewed
emphasis on the time-tested fundamentals of corporate
leadership sound management and long term vision.
Drawing on its global leadership in business and financial
journalism and its pedigree as being part of General Electric,
CNBC Asia Pacific and the leading business logistics solutions
company TNT present the region's first preeminent Asia
Business Leader Awards 2001.
The pan-regional awards recognises the achievements of
business leaders based in the Asia Pacific region under
the theme "Reinventing Corporate Asia".
Theme
Reinventing Corporate
Asia
Background
Since the 1960s, Asian countries have followed a developments
process likened to a flying geese formation. Japan started
first on the development path, followed by the four NIEs
(South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore and Hong Kong), and the
rest of the ASEAN economies. More recently China and the
formal socialist Indo-China countries have started their
own development processes.
The development process begins with a lesser developing
country exploiting its comparative advantage in low land
and labor costs. Industrialization takes off via exports
of light manufactured products (like textiles), foreign
investment and technology transfer. After a period of
high growth, cost of labor and land would eventually rise
and reduce competitiveness. The economy then undergoes
a structural change in which the country moves up the
value-added chain to produce higher end, more skill-intensive
manufacture like electronics. At each stage of the process,
the next lesser-developed country would then fill the
low-end sector vacuum left behind.
Business practices in Asia during this period have been
characterized by:
|
1.
|
Poor corporate governance and
opacity, manifested in corporate structures such
as family businesses or in conglomerates like the
South Korean Chaebols or the Japanese Kereitsus.
|
|
2.
|
Government-linked enterprises
reflecting heavy government and often inefficient
(with a liberal dash of corruption) involvement
in commerce.
|
|
3.
|
Tightly regulated un-innovative and
non-transparent financial processes. |
|
4.
|
Protected markets that primarily serve
vested interests and stifle competition |
A turning point
The Asian crisis of 1997 certainly did not change
the status quo overnight, but it did painfully highlight
many of these practices as unsustainable, especially if
countries wanted to maintain their export-oriented growth
policy within a framework of free cross-border capital
flows.
This has resulted in calls for deregulation, privatization
and reforms to force companies to become more competitive,
both on the part of the private and public sector with
a particular emphasis being laid on corporate governance.
While corporate reforms have proceeded at different speeds
and intensities throughout the Asia Pacific, other developments
occurred to impact on the shifting landscape of the business
environment. The promise of the "New Economy"
may have lost a little of its sheen, especially in the
wake of the NASDAQ crash early last year, but the premise
behind it remains fundamentally sound. Information technology
needs to be a key variable in any business equation and
this notion is transiting from the sensational 'vogue-speak'
into an accepted and internalized requirement for business.
New emerging forces of impact
|
•
|
Other underlying trends are also
beginning to emerge. One such trend is the potential
geo-economic shift in the Asia Pacific environment.
The center of gravity of the North-South divide
for the key export-led light manufacturing industries
is gradually moving away from the ASEAN region towards
North East Asia, along with the concomitant FDI
flows for these industries. During the crisis, Japan
slowed down much of their ASEAN investments and
outsourcing activities. The recovery of previous
years has brought this flow from Japan, but it is
increasingly redirecting itself towards North East
Asia and specifically China.
|
|
•
|
With liberalization and reform
being the catch phrases of the moment, economies
will become increasingly open and competitive. The
much-protected companies of before will need to
attain some semblance of efficiency in line with
international standards in order to survive the
onslaught of competitive forces.
|
|
•
|
Another emerging trend is the
shift in the focus of Asia Pacific as producer for
the industrialized West to that of Asia Pacific
as a consumer itself. Historically, export-led development
via high import tariffs and low-wage structures
have come at the expense of slower developing domestic
consumer markets. However, fifteen years of solid
pre-crisis economic growth have led to rising consumer
spending and retail sales despite attempts to curb
spending and restrain inflationary pressures. Furthermore,
credit payment systems have proliferated through
the region since 1991 and contributed to greater
access and spending on higher end goods. A host
of foreign companies have invested throughout Asia,
at first to primarily capitalize on Asian export
operations by securing low cost manufacturing sites
but also, in a smaller way to tap the local market
potential. With the potential of a slowing global
economy translating to lower exports, economies
in Asia can no longer rely solely on exports as
a source of income and growth. The share of consumer
spending in the growth equation will become increasingly
important.
|
|
•
|
We will continue to see the allure
of China's consumers as a key interest in the run
up to China's accession into the WTO and in fact
the planned reductions of intra-AFTA tariffs can
be seen as a response to this by trying to convince
the world to view South East Asia as a single market
of 500 million consumers as compared to the current
disparate small to medium economies.
|
A Corporation reinvented
to thrive and prosper in an environment that seeks a new
equilibrium
With the changing environment vis-à-vis the
above, corporations in Asia are operating under very fluid
and changeable conditions.
It took a crisis to highlight the structural imbalances
in corporation practice. The issue now is whether the
lessons have been learnt and whether the corporations
have identified and are responding to the emerging trends.
Those that have will survive and increase their market
share.
Judging will use proxies that reflect lessons learnt from
the Asian Crisis and other proxies that reflect a forward
looking and pro-active response to the emerging trends
to identify such corporations.
The
Award Categories
As Asia's premier business
leadership Awards, ABLA brings together some of the best-known
personalities in business today. Asia's top business people
vies for the coveted Asia Business Leader of the Year,
Innovator of the Year, Corporate Citizen of the Year and
CEOs' Choice of the Year Awards.
An independent panel of judges representing a wealth of
experience in senior management and the academe, led by
celebrated author and former Dean of the MIT Sloan School
of Management, Lester Thurow, selects the winners.
The winner for each award category is presented with a
trophy and a gala dinner in Singapore in November and
CNBC broadcasts highlights from the event and profile
the winners.
The
Winners
Congratulations to
the proud and deserving winners of the Asia Business Leader
Awards 2001!
Asia Business Leader
of the Year
K V Kamath
CEO & Managing Director, ICICI Limited
Corporate Citizen
of the Year
Richard Charles Helfer
President & CEO, Raffles Holdings
Innovator of the
Year
Mark Fields
Representative Director & President, Mazda Motor Corporation
CEOs' Choice of
the Year
Flemming Jacobs
CEO, Neptune Orient Lines Limited
Judging
Process
Strategic Intelligence
and the Asian Business Leader Award panel of judges will
undertake the nomination, selection and judging process.
CNBC, TNT and the sponsoring companies are not involved
in the process.
Entry Criteria
|
•
|
The candidate must hold the top
leadership role (e.g CEO or MD) for the past two
years or more in the company he/she is presently
employed in.
|
|
•
|
The company must have more than 150
employees to qualify for the award. |
|
•
|
The company's revenues or sales must
exceed USD50 million annually. |
|
•
|
The candidate's company must
be in one of the following markets: China, South
Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan, Thailand, Malaysia,
Singapore, Indonesia, the Philippines, Laos, Cambodia,
Myanmar, Vietnam, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and
Sri Lanka.
|
Entry Process
Upon nomination, each
candidate will receive an entry pack and will be requested
to answer approximately 30 - 40 questions relating to
his/her role as a leader of the company.
Judging Panel
The judging panel led
by MIT Professor of Management and Economics, and celebrated
author of "Building Wealth" and "The Future
of Capitalism", Lester Thurow, comprise of internationally
famous and independent professionals with Asia experience,
Asia's corporate strategists, respected academics and
retired CEOs. Not forgetting international management
thinkers from the leading schools of IMD and INSEAD.
The judging panel comprises the following members:
|
•
|
Lester Thurow
MIT Professor of Management and Economics
Author of "Building Wealth" and "Future
of Capitalism" |
|
•
|
Professor Dr. Juwono Sudarsonno
Professor of University of Indonesia's Faculty of
Social and Politics Science
Commissioner of Strategic Intelligence Indonesia |
|
•
|
Professor Yung Chul Park
Professor of Economics at Korea University
Chairman of the Board, KEB bank in Seoul |
|
•
|
Dr. Bernardo Villegas
Dean of the School of Economics at the University
of Asia and the Pacific |
|
•
|
Professor Hellmut Schutte
Associate Dean to Executive Education Asia |
|
•
|
Professor Fan Gang
Director of National institute of Economic Research,
China Reform Foundation
Professor of Economics, Graduate School of Chinese
Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) |
|
•
|
Professor Takatoshi Ito
Director of the Institute of Economic Research
Professor of Economics at the Hitotsubashi University |
|
•
|
Mr. Abdul Razak Baginda
Executive Director of the Malaysian Strategic Centre |
|
