Board of Directors
MS. CAROLINE CAI JINQING – Partner, Brunswick Group
Ms. Cai Jinqing is a Partner at Brunswick Group, an international financial communication firm. She advises multinational corporations and Chinese companies on strategic communication issues as well as on cross-border Merger & Acquisition transactions in the region. She has previously worked in New York and Hong Kong in management consulting and venture capital focusing on China investments. Ms. Cai graduated from Wellesley College with a Bachelor of Arts degree and obtained her Master of Public Affairs from the Woodrow Wilson School of International and Public Affairs at Princeton University.
MR. PETER GEITHNER – Advisor, Asia Center at Harvard University
Mr. Peter F. Geithner is an advisor to the Asia Center at Harvard University and a consultant to the Asia Pacific Philanthropy Consortium, Rockefeller Foundation, Sasakawa Peace Foundation, and other organizations. He serves on the boards of the National Committee on United States-China Relations, the China Center for Economic Research (Peking University), the Center for the Advanced Study of India (University of Pennsylvania), Clemente (Holdings) Asia, Inc., and the Institute of Current World Affairs. Mr. Geithner was with The Ford Foundation for 28 years, where he held program management positions mainly concerned with Asia. He was Director of Asia Programs from 1990 to 1996. Prior to assuming that position, he served for two and a half years as the Foundation’s first representative in Beijing, China. Mr. Geithner is a graduate of Dartmouth College (BA) and the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (MA). He is a recipient of the State Department Distinguished Service Award .
MR. HUA XINGHONG – Managing Director, Cerberus Capital Management, Asia
Mr. Hua Xinghong is currently the Managing Director of Cerberus Capital Management’s Asian operations. From 2004-2008 he was Vice President of Business Development and Strategy at the Asia-Pacific Branch of the mining and materials firm Alcoa. Prior to that, he held management positions with the energy firms Pace Global Energy and the Atlantic Richfield Company. Mr. Hua also serves on the advisory board of Chinglish.com, an internet platform designed to facilitate business opportunities between Chinese and English speaking professionals. He received his Bachelors and Masters degrees from Peking University in International Relations and also holds a Masters Degree in International Economics from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies.
DR. PETER LIGHTE – Chairman, JPMorgan Chase Bank, China
Dr. Peter Lighte is the Chairman of JPMorgan Chase Bank (China). Prior to his return to China in 2007, he was associated with the bank in London, Hong Kong and Tokyo. He previously lived in Beijing as Founding Representative of Manufacturers Hanover Trust Company, during which time he also served as President of the American Chamber of Commerce. Fluent in Mandarin, Dr. Lighte has served on the board of the London City Ballet, was a member of the Executive Committee of the Princeton Alumni Council, Director of the Matilda Child Development Centre (Hong Kong) and JPMorgan representative to the Hayward Gallery in London. Currently, Dr. Lighte serves on the corporate advisory board for Hope and Homes for Children (UK), is a member of the advisory board of China Institute Executive Summit, and serves on the Board of Directors of the Half the Sky Foundation. He holds a Ph.D. from Princeton University in East Asian Studies and is the father of two daughters, adopted from Hangzhou and Luoyang.
MS. DEE POON – Director, Y.L. Yang-Esquel Education Foundation, Hong Kong
Ms. Dee Poon graduated from Harvard College in 2004, where she earned a bachelors degree in Philosophy. Dee worked in Hong Kong as a buyer for Hong Kong Seibu. In 2005 she became the manager of PYE, the retail arm of the Esquel Group. Ms. Poon serves on the boards of the Hong Kong Ambassadors of Design, Zuni Icosahedron, and the Y.L. Yang – Esquel Education Foundation, as well as on the Hong Kong Trade Development Council’s Design, Marketing and Licensing Services Advisory Committee. She is an editor-at-large for iLook magazine and a featured columnist for Modern Weekly.
MS. SHARON RUWART – Director, of Corporate Affairs, Asia Pacific for Mars, Incorporated
Ms. Sharon Ruwart is Director of Corporate Affairs, Asia Pacific for Mars, Incorporated, whose brands include M&Ms, Snickers, Pedigree, Whiskas and many other iconic confectionary and pet food products. Her responsibilities include corporate positioning, stakeholder relations, industry advocacy and crisis communications for Mars in the APAC region.
Prior to joining Mars in 2010, Ms. Ruwart was Managing Director, Beijing for APCO Worldwide, a global public affairs consultancy with a long history in China and Asia. She consulted for a range of clients helping them develop comprehensive government relations, communications and CSR strategies for China. Before APCO, Sharon served as China Managing Director for Elsevier Science & Technology, the world's largest provider of scientific information.
She has lived with her family in Beijing since 2004 and first came to China as an English teacher with the Yale-China Association in 1985 in Changsha, Hunan Province and Hong Kong. She holds a BA degree from Yale and an MBA from Stanford University.
DR. SUN ZHE – Director, Center for US-China Relations, Tsinghua University
Dr. Sun Zhe is a Professor at the Institute for International Studies and the Director of the Center for US-China Relations at Tsinghua University. He is the former Deputy Director of the Center for American Studies at Fudan University, and has previously served as the spokesperson for the Boao Forum for Asia in 2002. Dr. Sun often appears as an expert commentator on NPR, VOA, CCTV, Shanghai TV, and in the Global Times, among many others. His research interests include trade and economic relations between the US and China, comparative legal studies (in particular US Congress and China's National People's Congress), and US-China relations. Dr. Sun is currently working on a paper on Obama´s strategy for global development and its implications for China, as well as on a manuscript on democracy and US-China relations.
DR. WANG JISI – Director, School of International Studies, Peking University
Dr. Wang Jisi has been Dean of Peking University’s School of International Studies since 2005. Concurrently, he is Director of the Institute of International and Strategic Studies at the Party School of the Communist Party of the China Central Committee, a Guest Professor of the National Defense University of the People’s Liberation Army, Vice-Chairman of the China Reform Forum, and President of the Chinese Association for American Studies. He was Director and a Senior Researcher of the Institute of American Studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing from 1993 to 2005. He is a Founding Member of the Pacific Council on International Policy in Los Angeles, and serves on the advisory boards of the Brookings Institution Center for Northeast Asian Policy Studies, the Stanford University East Asian Security Program, and the Harvard University Asia Center. Dr. Wang's scholarly interests include international relations theory, US foreign policy, Chinese foreign policy, and China-US relations.
MS. MEI ZHANG – Executive Director, Office of Government Affairs, Goldman Sachs Asia
Mei Zhang is an executive director in the Office of Government Affairs at Goldman Sachs Asia. Based in Hong Kong, she covers government and regulatory relations in Asia Pacific with a focus on Greater China. Mei joined Goldman Sachs in 2002 as an executive director in the Corporate Communications Department in Asia. Mei had also acted as a central coordinator of the firm’s China initiatives, including government and regulatory relations, internal communications, sponsorships and charitable services. Prior to joining the firm, Mei had worked at Salomon Smith Barney, an affiliate of Citigroup, as a Vice President of Corporate Communications in Asia. She had also worked as producer and editor at CNN in the headquarters in Atlanta and in Hong Kong for total of five years. A native Chinese, Mei grew up in northeastern China and received a Bachelor’s Degree of Art in International Journalism from Beijing Institute of International Relations, and a Master’s Degree of Mass Communications from Louisiana State University, USA.
