for the U.S. and China
Friday, April 20, 2018
UCLA Anderson School of Management
The General Secretary of the Communist Party of China, Xi Jinping, presented his report to the 19th Party Congress to outline China’s mid and long-term development goals over the next three decades. Innovation, coordination, greenness, openness, and inclusiveness will be the five guiding principles to ensure the country’s goal of building a “moderately prosperous society” will be achieved by 2020. Meanwhile, the U.S. under President Donald Trump is reevaluating its approach to trade, especially with respect to China, but no major policy shifts appear imminent despite the recognition by the U.S. of the importance of China’s Belt and Road Initiative. Threats of protectionism, trade walls, and increased tariffs have thus far failed to blunt the rising trade between the two Pacific powers. New cross-border partnerships are being formed and new opportunities are opening up for trade and investment in a number of key sectors from energy to finance.
The 2018 Wilbur K. Woo Greater China Business Conference will bring together successful U.S. and Chinese leaders, investors and influencers from a variety of industries and sectors who will discuss the importance of innovation, collaboration and new technology, as well as diversification and localization. They will share their insights on emerging trends, identify bright spots for future investment and explore new and creative investment strategies and partnerships that take advantage of opportunities in this new era of economic ties and bilateral investment between the world’s two superpowers.
What to expect:
- Successful and influential U.S. and Chinese business leaders and experienced investors across a variety of industries and sectors with expertise in cross-border business and investment
- Plenary and breakout sessions around the themes of: innovation, collaboration and advanced technology and transformation, diversification and localization – new and important investment strategies and partnerships. Topics include advanced technologies; real estate; media and entertainment; entrepreneurship, investment and growth strategies; and financial risk, monetary policy and SOE reforms
- Catered networking reception
11:30 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. |
REGISTRATION AND CHECK-IN | Korn Convocation Hall Foyer, Entrepreneurs Hall | |
11:30 a.m. - 12:45 p.m. |
CAREER PANEL LUNCHTIME DISCUSSION | Executive Dining Room, Gold Hall, B208 and B209 Open to UCLA students only. Lunch will be provided. |
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1:00 - 1:30 p.m. |
WELCOMING REMARKS & OPENING ADDRESS | Korn Convocation Hall | |
Judy D. Olian | Dean and John E. Anderson Chair in Management, UCLA Anderson Michael K. Woo | Son of Wilbur K. Woo; Dean, College of Environmental Design, Cal Poly Pomona Pin Tai | Chief Executive Officer and President of Cathay General Bancorp and Cathay Bank |
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1:30 - 2:15 p.m. |
CHINA: A MACRO OVERVIEW & A BUSINESS PERSPECTIVE | Korn Convocation Hall | |
Feng An | Founder and Executive Director, Innovation Center for Energy and Transportation (iCET), U.S.-China Cleantech Center (UCCTC) William Yu | Economist, UCLA Anderson Forecast MODERATOR: Seamus Jiang | Managing Director, Co-Leader for China-U.S. Cross-Border Deals, PwC |
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2:15 - 3:15 p.m. |
PLENARY SESSION I | Korn Convocation Hall |
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Jeff Barney | Chief Operating Officer, TP-Link North America, Inc. Jim Cheng | Director AI Lab, Suning USA R&D Center Patrick Duan | Vice President of Operations, BYD Motors Inc. Chunyan (Charlene) Li | General Manager, iFLYTEK North America MODERATOR: John (J.B.) Blevins ('11) | Faculty Director, Easton Technology Management Center; Adjunct Professor of Decisions, Operations and Technology Management, UCLA Anderson |
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Description: |
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3:15 - 3:45 p.m. |
BREAK AND REFRESHMENTS | Marion Anderson Courtyard | |
3:45 - 4:45 p.m. |
CONCURRENT PANEL DISCUSSIONS | |
ENTREPRENEURSHIP, INVESTMENT AND GROWTH STRATEGIES: Trends, Investment Patterns and Opportunities for Private Entrepreneurship, Foreign Investment in China and China’s Outbound Investment | Korn Convocation Hall Wei Guo | Founding Partner, UpHonest CapitalJohn Ho | Chief Executive Officer, Landsea Homes Richard Jun | Co-Founder and Managing Director, BAM Ventures Maggie Sun | Partner, Capital Markets Accounting Advisory - Deals, PwC MODERATOR: James Rice (B.A. '91) | President and Chief Executive Officer, Solaris Paper, Inc. Description: FINANCIAL RISK, MONETARY POLICY AND SOE REFORMS: Implications and Opportunities for Business | C-315 Steven Foland | Managing Director and Head of Banking, Americas, CICC Description: REAL ESTATE: The Importance of Diversification, Localization and Community Engagement | C-301 Theresa Kwang | Executive Director of Finance, SCG America Description: |
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5:00 - 6:00 p.m. |
PLENARY SESSION II | Korn Convocation Hall MEDIA & ENTERTAINMENT: Understanding Hollywood’s Challenges and the Opportunities in China |
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Dan Goman | Founder and Chief Executive Officer, OWNZONES Media Network Hao Lin | Senior Board Executive, Alibaba Cloud Jason Miller (’12) | Senior Vice President, Talent International and Emerging Markets, Live Nation MODERATOR: Jon Niermann (’95)| President and Chief Executive Officer, Loop Media, Inc.; Founder, FarWest Entertainment; Former President, Walt Disney Company Asia-Pacific; Former President, Electronic Arts Asia |
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Description: |
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6:00 - 7:30 p.m. |
NETWORKING RECEPTION | Executive Dining Room, Gold Hall |





























Wilbur K. Woo (B.S. '42), vice chairman emeritus of Cathay Bank and Cathay Bancorp, Inc., was known for his decades of leadership in the Chinese-American community, but his many achievements never caused him to forget his humble beginnings.
He was born in 1916 in a tiny village near Guangzhou in China's southern Guangdong province. He came to Los Angeles at age five. At 12, his father sent him back to Guangzhou to be immersed in Chinese language and culture. In 1940, after two years at Lingnan College (now part of Sun Yat-Sen University), he returned to Los Angeles to complete his education at UCLA.
Like many immigrants, he found humbling work, washing dishes in a small Chinatown restaurant. He also taught at Chinese language schools in the evenings and was popular with his students, who decades later would pay their respects to their teacher whenever they saw him in the community.
During World War II, Wilbur worked as a translator in the Office of Postal Censorship, rising to chief of the Technical Operations Division. After the war, he graduated from UCLA with a degree in business administration and went to work with his father managing Chungking Produce Company, which thrived for 40 years supplying restaurants and grocery stores with Chinese vegetables and other produce.
In 1962, at a time when mainstream banks would not make loans to many ethnic Chinese, Wilbur joined Cathay Bank - the first Chinese-American-owned bank - as a vice president. With a knack for community outreach, he played a central role in the bank's growth over the next decades and rose to senior vice president, administrative vice president and executive vice president.
Alongside his distinguished career in banking, Wilbur cultivated an extraordinarily rich variety of business, political, cultural and charitable interests. He served as chairman of the board of The Chinese Times, the oldest Chinese language newspaper in the U.S.; charter chairman of the Asian American National Business Alliance; founder and chairman of the California-Taiwan Trade & Investment Council; president of the Chinese Chamber of Commerce; and organizer and secretary-general of the 8th World Chinese Traders Convention. One of his proudest accomplishments, as grand president of the Chinese American Citizens Alliance, was lobbying for the historic immigration reform bill of the mid-1960s that opened the doors to a new wave of immigrants from China and Taiwan.
He served as an honorary member (representing overseas Chinese) of Taiwan’s Legislative Yuan (or national legislature) and was a member of Taiwan’s Overseas Chinese Affairs Commission, the California World Trade Commission and the California Commission for Economic Development. He was an organizer and convener of the World Chinese Bankers Convention held in Los Angeles in 1988. That year he was named one of the "20 Most Powerful Men in Los Angeles" by Los Angeles magazine.
In 1996, crowning his numerous awards for public service, Wilbur became the first Asian American to be honored by UCLA with the Neil H. Jacoby International Award.
In 2001 he and his wife, Beth, endowed the annual Wilbur K. Woo Greater China Business Conference at the UCLA Anderson School of Management with the goal of promoting understanding of the economic ties between the Greater China region and the United States. "I established the conference to show my gratitude for the training I received at my alma mater many years ago," he said.
Sadly, Wilbur passed away on November 12, 2012 and Beth, his wife of nearly 75 years, passed away on March 2, 2017. Wilbur and Beth are survived by their four children, six grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren.