Ho Chi Minh City – The VinaCapital Foundation today hosted a meeting between top business leaders and a visiting delegation of faculty from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

The roundtable event was the third in a series of discussions launched by the International Management Institute of Vietnam (IMIV), a project of the VinaCapital Foundation.
The Wharton School delegation includes six professors and is led by Jeffrey Sheehan, Associate Dean for International Relations, and included five professors all taking part in The Wharton School’s Faculty International Seminar in Vietnam.

“Through our discussions with executives from the public and private sectors, we hope to learn more about Vietnam to enrich our teaching,” explained Mr. Sheehan. “For some of the faculty, we also hope to identify opportunities to return to Vietnam for further research.”
The VinaCapital Foundation’s IMIV program was established to promote management excellence in Vietnam.

“One of the objectives of the IMIV program is to create new opportunities for dialogue,” said Don Lam, CEO of VinaCapital Group. “Hosting an event like this brings together leaders of successful Vietnamese companies and faculty from one of the most prestigious business schools in the world, allowing both sides to discuss management theories and their application within the Vietnam business environment.”

The Wharton School’s MBA program was recently ranked number one in the world by the Financial Times and number four by Business Week magazine. The Wharton School faculty delegation includes Professors Harbir Singh, Arnold Rosoff, David Hsu, Pavel Savor, Valery Yakubovich and John Zhang.

Prominent business leaders joining the roundtable meeting included: Dr. Ly Qui Trung, Founder and CEO of Pho 24 Corporation; Mr. Canh Do, General Director for BP’s Phu My 3; Mr. Le Cong Dinh, Managing Partner at DC Lawyers; Mr. Nguyen Quoc Khanh, General Director of AA Corporation; Mr. Phan Quoc Cong, Chairman of ICP Vietnam; Dr. Pham Phu Ngoc Trai, General Director of Pepsico; and Mr. Phil Tran, General Director of Glass Egg Digital Media. The executives were joined by VinaCapital staff including: Mr. Don Lam, CEO; Mr. Hoang Duc Trung, Director of DFJV; Ms. Due M. Quach, Director of Private Equity Investment and Ms. Dana Doan, IMIV Director.

About The Wharton School
Established in 1881, The Wharton School is the first collegiate school of business. Wharton is also the largest, most cited business school faculty, with 265 standing and associate members, 11 academic departments, 25-plus research centers and initiatives, leading undergraduate, MBA, PhD, and executive programs. The school has over 80,000 alumni in 140 countries around the world. The Financial Times ranked Wharton number one in its Global MBA Rankings for 2009. Business Week magazine ranked Wharton number two for its Executive MBA program and number four for its full-time MBA program.

VinaCapital Foundation
The VinaCapital Foundation (VCF) is a Vietnam and US-registered 501(c)(3) non-governmental organization founded in 2006 to help alleviate poverty and improve the status of the poor in Vietnam by increasing access to quality healthcare for children, improving medical institutions, and supporting high-level programs that build business knowledge and executive leadership. Programs include Heartbeat Vietnam, which funds cardiac operations for poor children; the Telemedicine Series, a Clinton Global Initiative that continues the medical education of physicians in Southeast Asia via teleconference; and the International Management Institute of Vietnam, an international-standard training centre for Vietnam’s business leaders. The VinaCapital Group matches 100 percent of all donations to VCF and covers the Foundation’s expenses so that 100 percent of all donations go directly to program work.