On December 16, 2022, SISU MBA Forum: Looking into 2023: Opportunities in the New Era was successfully held. This forum was themed on the development of a new economy in the context of Covid-19, which explored potential challenges and opportunities in 2023, with a focus on the impacts of Covid-19, conflicts of geopolitics and changes in the trading environment. Mr. Shao Yu, Doctor of Finance, chief economist of Orient Securities, Mr. Wang Jiasheng, CEO of Suofeila International Children’s Art School, Prof. Yang Xiaolan, deputy dean of School of Business and Management, SISU, Mr. Zheng Ke, Mason Scholar in Harvard University, financial analyst, Prof. Shen Qiang from School of Business and Management, SISU attended the forum. Topics of their speeches ranged from Investment Decisions and Wealth Accumulation, On Reshaping New Business Patterns and Consuming Behaviors from the Perspective of Education, Accelerating consumption growth by financial instruments to Discovering Investment Motivation and Speculation of Metaverse. This forum was hosted by Zhang Jingjing, a student of class 2021, FT3 from School of Business and Management MBA and the roundtable session was hosted by Prof. Shen Qiang.
Opening Speech
Zhang Jingjing started the speech with a brief introduction of SISU MBA Center, which is devoted to cultivate BORDERLESS MANAGEMENT elites to create value for the world. SBM, SISU has been working on high level disciplines since it established the major of management in 1985. SBM has built a comprehensive education and research system that integrates bachelor, master and doctor degrees, and combines academic and professional degrees. It has doctoral and post-doctoral programs in the Tier-I discipline of Business Administration. Nowadays, it has introduced a batch of prominent scholars with vision, cutting-edge knowledge and practical experiences from world-class universities like Harvard University, University of Pennsylvania, GA Institute of Technology, Cambridge University and Tsinghua University. In addition, among its faculty, 6 figures are nominated for The National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars and Chang Jiang Scholars Program, 19 figures are listed into Program for New Century Excellent Talents in University and Shanghai Leading Figure Plan. 40 national projects including China Brian Project, key projects of National Natural Science Foundation of China are carried out by SBM. And it is a member of AACSB and EFMD, with AMBA-accredited MBA programs. Relying on the Key Laboratory of Brain-Machine Intelligence for Information Behavior (Shanghai Municipality and Ministry of Education), SBM builds an innovative model of scientific education in the disciplinary laboratory, which enables SBM to stand in the forefront of academic research around the globe and makes it toward an advanced and evidence-based approach. Today, SBM has grown to be the best management school among similar universities. Welcome to SISU MBA!Following are professors and entrepreneurs who delivered speeches.
Dr.Shao Yu: Post-pandemic Era－Investment Decisions and Wealth Accumulation
Dr.Shao Yu pointed out that the pandemic has brought huge changes and impacts to the world, influencing many aspects including political parties, economy, society, enterprises and geopolitics, among which concerns us most may be implications on society and global economies. Inside a society, the most striking character in the post-pandemic era is an unprecedented division. Economists in China have discovered that the world tends to take a K form, meaning that developed countries may develop further, rich countries may become richer while others may go opposite. For global economies, differences of values or judgments may emerge. That is to say, economies are inclined to consider fairness as the most important factor in this new era. When it comes to policies, common wealth is put at the core place, under which all industries are taking a toll. Among economies, a major problem has cropped out in the process of globalization. Besides, it is projected that competition between major countries will get more fierce, especially noticeable between China and America. Competition will focus on three respects: supply chain nearshoring, weaponization, politicalization and grouplization of technological innovation, abuse of privilege in monetary system.
The future trend of China may be hinted through the report of the 20th CPC National Congress. Then Dr. Shao talked about two concrete aspects, coordinated regional development and modern industrial system. The focus of the former goes to specific regions and specific sectors and enterprises while the latter concentrates on 4 aspects of power engine, performers, new infrastructures and the empowered.
Dr. Shao put that there is going to be some pressure on economy in the short run, as it will take some time for the economy as a whole to recover from the pandemic, which is projected to be due in March next year. At last, Dr. Shao concluded that in order to excel in the future, we need to evaluate some major historic changes and in turn to upgrade our micro allocation of resources and thus maximize resources in key industries and sectors.
Mr.Wang Jiasheng: On Reshaping New Business Patterns and Consuming Behaviors from the Perspective of Education
Mr. Wang Jiasheng pointed out that due to the policy of easing the burden of excessive homework and off-campus tutoring for students undergoing compulsory education, the policy of all inclusiveness and negative growth of population, tutoring schools in communities and shopping malls have dramatically withered, the way of entertainment, attitude towards education and consumption behaviors inside families have changed. Besides, with the policy of regular epidemic prevention and control, the booming development of e-commerce and live stream, traditional malls have been influenced in one way or another. Offline consumption is shifting towards one with influencer IP and hype. Moreover, new infrastructures for children’s education and for children’s health can help upgrade consumption, prompting new opportunities for brands.
Furthermore, Mr. Wang mentioned that urban renewal and rural revitalization may put forward many business opportunities, such as the rise of business district surrounding schools and governmental revamp of districts. The strategy of rural revitalization in the report of the 20th CPC National Congress hints that rural areas are making such development plans as the development of industries, culture and tourism, craftsman to build new organism. And as to agricultural products, e-commerce and live stream can act as a big player in selling these products to large cities.
Tens of thousands of people or even more have taken the brunt during the past upheavals, but a lot of lessons can be learned through it. Peter F.Drucker once proclaimed that “The greatest danger in times of turbulence is not the turbulence; it is to act with yesterday's logic”. Mr. Wang quoted this sentence to show his opinions. Then Mr. Wang wrapped up his speech with the hope that all enterprises may exploit more opportunities, achieve more and gain more insights into business development in the new era, as dangers and opportunities are interchangeable.
Prof. Yang Xiaolan: Accelerating consumption growth by financial instruments
Prof. Yang Xiaolan pointed out that on the world’s average, consumption accounts for 60% in GDP growth, serving as the main force in driving economic development. In recent years, consumption slows down and consuming desires of citizens decline in China, evidenced by a negative growth for the first time in 2020. Thus, to boost consuming desires, effectively expand domestic demand make for key tasks of the sustainable development of China’s economy and promoting smooth domestic circulation during the14th Five-Year Plan period.
By conducting 2 experiments, Prof. Yang studied whether individuals can optimize their consumption decisions by using financial instruments. In the first experiment, she stimulated the consumption scenarios in one person’s lifetime by putting forward 3 research questions and presumptions and designing experiment situations. She found out that taking advantage of debit and credit in monetary market can on the one hand diminish the influence of uncertainty, and on the other hand may increase the efficacy of consumption. As there may be deviation in the first experiment, it is found that consumption decisions of some people may not match their optimal consumption level. In this way, the second experiment was designed to study whether the design of some mechanisms can direct consumers to make correct decisions. According to the Nudge Theory of Thaler, a Nobel prize winner, the second experiment designed 4 nudge theories. It turned out that nudge helped consumption decisions to match the optical level. The four nudges were default consumption, case study, suggestions, discussion on policies, the effects of which decreased in proper order.
Then Prof. Yang moved form findings of experiments to the current situation of consumption growth, further summarizing problems existed in consumption and service growth of financial market. Four major points were raised, namely lack of accuracy and systematic management in consumption, finance and service, insufficient awareness and competence of citizens to optimize consumption level by means of financial instruments, insufficient compliance in consumption and financial products, limited value-adding function for capital market. Last but not least, Prof. Yang proposed some suggestions regarding four aspects of supply, demand, supervision, market to boost consumption by making good use of financial market.
Mr.Zheng Ke: Discovering Investment Motivation and Speculation of Metaverse
Mr. Zheng Ke started his speech with cases of Metaverse in reality including virtual graduation ceremony in one of American universities during the height of the pandemic, conducting virtual concert in Metaverse. Then Mr. Zheng rendered that Metaverse is an open digital world with social attributes, constructed by digital technology.
After that, Mr. Zheng pointed out that the business mode of Metaverse is contract-based and is similar to the Internet, and that enterprises acted as participators rather than organizers in Metavers by giving the example of the novel Avalanche written in 1992 and the story of a deliveryman who saved Metaverse. Metaverse is full of diverse technologies and business opportunities. From the perspective of the closed-loop logic of economic values and business opportunities, it involves the chain of value to market to economic system to interpersonal relations.
Besides, Mr. Zheng explained further by citing two reasons for the popularity of Roblox, a game platform driven by contents created by users. First goes to the network effect of the platform itself, with game currency inspiring creation. Second comes the network effect of social platforms, with emphasis on unified identity of users. However, three problems loomed large, which were value distribution of creators, demand for funds in building economic systems and guidance for teenagers.
In the end, Mr. Zheng put forward two aspects of opportunities related to Metaverse that can be discussed. One is application in industries, taking chances and approaches in To B end into account. Another may be technological opportunities by achieving Metaverse through experience, discovery and computing.
Roundtable Session
Finally comes the roundtable session, with students actively raising questions. Mr. Wang Jiasheng, Prof. Yang Xiaolan and Mr. Zheng Ke answered three questions respectively, namely what are the opportunities and channels of education industry in the context of Covid-19, what preparations can be made to become leaders in financial industry and what’s the trend of artificial intelligence and the prospect of its application in different sectors.
We hope that everyone can gain something from this forum and we will bring more forums on different themes in the future. Please stay tuned!
