Courses & Events

Entrepreneurship in Southeast Asia

Tuesday, Apr 9, 2013

04:15 pm - 05:30 pm

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Role of Southeast Asia in the Global Strategies of Asian Startups

To follow on our first session in the series, we will address the emergence of global entrepreneurs and cross-border startups in Southeast Asia and also explore other trends in the region with regards to their  connection to the global marketplace.

While the GDP growth of China and the world declined overall from 5.1% in 2010 to 3.3% in 2012, the Southeast Asian economies seemed to have been largely unaffected by this slowdown.  This may be due in part to the entrepreneurial activity in Southeast Asia supporting domestic economic growth in addition to their rising role in the global supply chain management processes as China continues to slow down.

In this session, Dr. Edward Rubesch, Faculty Member of the Business School at Thammasat University, and Mr. Don Tran, Chairman and CEO of Global Equipment Services, will discuss the opportunities that have emerged for entrepreneurs in Southeast Asia as well as for startups in other countries who are seeking to expand their operations and businesses into Southeast Asia.

Dr. Edward Rubesch is a serial entrepreneur in Thailand, and he is currently the Director of the IMBA Program, the Center of Sustainable Enterprise, and the Global SocialVenture Competition at Thammasat Business School.  He also assists the Director of the Technology Licensing Office for Thailand’s National Science and Technology Development Agency.  His goal is to increase the number of innovation-based startups in Thailand.  Educated as a mechanical engineer, Dr. Rubesch received his  Bachelor and Master of Science degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.  He received a Master of Management degree from the Sasin Graduate School of Business, a program in Thailand, offered jointly by the Kellogg School of Northwestern University, the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and Chulalongkorn University.  He completed his Ph.D at Thammasat University, with a study of border entrepreneurs in the Greater Mekong Subregion.  He is active in academic research in the areas of entrepreneurship, innovation, and distribution in developing countries.

Mr. Don Tran has more than 20 years of experience in the semiconductor industry and has held numerous vice president and senior executive management positions in product development, global business operations, and sales and marketing with several major public US semiconductor equipment companies; among them were Mattson Technology, Semitool Inc., Silicon Valley Group Inc., Watkins Johnson Co.  Don has also been a co-founder and executive officer of three hi-tech companies in the semiconductor equipment space funded by venture capitals as well as corporate strategic and private investors in US and Asia.  Currently he is the Chairman & CEO of GES Inc. a growing turnkey semiconductor and hi tech production equipment design and manufacturing company that has operations in the US, Vietnam, Japan and India.  Before beginning his career in the semiconductor industry, Don had a four year stint with NASA where he was involved in flight simulation development and aeronautical research including the space shuttle projects.  Don earned his MBA degree from Pepperdine University, an MSME from San Jose State University, and a BSCE degree from the University of California, Davis.

Immediately following the session, we’ll have a short-networking reception from 5:30 – 6:15PM.  This is the second session in the US-Asia Technology Management Center’s ten week seminar series on “Entrepreneurship in Asian High-Tech Industries.”

Presented by the US-Asia Technology Management Center in Stanford’s School of Engineering, with support from the Miner Foundation and major series support from ISI Dentsu of America.

Stanford University | Skilling Auditorium

494 Lomita Drive • Stanford, CA

Tuesday, April 9th, 2013 • 4:15-5:30PM