Where is the legal line drawn in animal rights activism?
WASHINGTON A federal courthouse in Boston and a ranch in Californias San Joaquin Valley present competing faces of the animal rights movement.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; One side is peaceful. The other, decidedly, is not. Both can feel the weight of the law and the sting of being called a terrorist.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; At the giant Harris Ranch, in western Fresno County, investigators are trying to solve the Jan. 8 arson that damaged 14 tractors and several cattle-hauling trailers. Anonymous animal rights activists claimed responsibility for the fire.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; The Harris Ranch arson was clearly a crime, however it happened. But in a new lawsuit, animal advocates with a far different tactical approach contend that Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein and other lawmakers went too far the last time Congress addressed animal rights activism, in 2006.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; Were not saying that one cant punish arson, attorney Rachel Meeropol said in an interview Friday, but thats not what the (2006) law is about. The law reaches far too broadly.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; Meeropol, whos with the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights, is representing Minneapolis resident Sarahjane Blum and four other activists in the lawsuit, filed Dec. 15. It argues that the 2006 Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act violates the First Amendment rights of those who want to protest how animals are treated.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; Blum, for one, founded GourmetCruelty.com, whose advocacy efforts helped persuade the California legislature in 2004 to ban traditional foie gras production. The ban, which blocks the force-feeding of ducks for the purpose of enlarging the birds liver beyond normal size, takes effect in July.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; Under the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act, animal rights advocates may be prosecuted for actions that cause the loss of any real or personal property … used by an animal enterprise and for interstate travel that has the purpose of damaging or interfering with the operations of an animal enterprise.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; The animal rights advocates lawsuit argues that the broadly worded law could be used to prosecute activities such as picketing, if companies lose business or have to pay for extra security because of it.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; Blum was stunned that the ethical, important work that she had devoted her life to had been turned overnight into terrorism, the lawsuit says, adding that she now curtails advocacy that risks prosecution under the law.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; The Justice Department hasnt filed its response.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; Lawmakers, though, say tougher laws and stricter penalties are needed to stop zealous activism that evolves into violence. Feinstein, in supporting the 2006 law, cited attempted bombings that targeted a University of California at Los Angeles primate research center and a San Francisco Bay Area pharmaceutical company.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; This legislation is crucial to respond to the expanded scope of terrorist activity, Feinstein said during Senate debate.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; Feinstein was the only Democrat to join Republicans, including Sens. John Cornyn of Texas and current presidential candidate Rick Santorum, a former Pennsylvania senator, in co-sponsoring the Senate bill. It eventually passed the House of Representatives and the Senate easily, but it hasnt yet been extensively used.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; In 2009, federal prosecutors used the law to charge four activists with going too far in their protests against animal research labs at University of California campuses at Berkeley and Santa Cruz.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; The defendants are accused of chanting slogans such as 1, 2, 3, 4, open up the cage door; 5, 6, 7, 8, smash the locks and liberate; 9, 10, 11, 12, vivisectors go to hell, the Justice Department noted in a June 15, 2009, court filing.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; US District Judge Ronald Whyte, whom President George HW Bush appointed to the bench, dismissed the case in 2010.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; In another rare use of the law, Utah residents William Viehl and Alex Hall pleaded guilty and were sentenced to nearly two years in prison for releasing hundreds of minks in 2008 at a mink farm and spray-painting slogans that included, No more mink, no more murder.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; The Utah incident was less kinetic than what happened near Coalinga, Calif., on the early morning of Jan. 8, when firefighters needed 45 minutes to put out a blaze that started at the Harris Ranch truck storage area.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; An anonymous statement subsequently posted on a website maintained by the North American Animal Liberation Press Office, which calls itself a clearinghouse for others, said the attack showed the enemy is still vulnerable and signed off until next time.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; Feinsteins office has been in contact with the Harris Ranch since the incident, according to a spokesman.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; Farm groups insist that animal rights groups must help find the perpetrators.lt;/pgt;lt;pgt; If they sit by silently while animal rightists attack law-abiding businesses, they are passively endorsing domestic terrorism, Paul Wenger, the president of the California Farm Bureau Federation, said last week in a statement.
Gulf Bank successfully completes the implementation of enterprise risk …
Gulf Bank announced today the successful installation of its new Enterprise Risk Management System from SunGard, one of the world’s leading software and technology services companies. This state-of-the-art system was completed on schedule in December 2011. Consultants from Sungard and AFS, their Bahrain-based Middle East distributor, worked closely with the Bank on this project.
Gulf Bank’s use of SunGard’s system will be for five separate risk management streams, namely, Capital Computation under Basel II for credit, market and operational risks, Asset Liability Management (ALM) amp; Funds Transfer Pricing (FTP), Market Risk Management, which covers the banking and trading books, and Operational Risk Management.
Mr. Saleem Sheikh, Chief Risk Officer and General Manager of Risk Management at Gulf Bank said: “We are delighted to be the first Bank to implement the full suite of SunGard’s Enterprise Risk Management system, and even more delighted that we have done so on schedule. It has proved to be a challenging task but through the dedication, commitment and hard work of several individuals in the project team we were able to complete it on time. I would like to extend my thanks and gratitude to all those responsible for this success as it is an important milestone for us as at Gulf Bank and it raises the bar in Risk Management standards in Kuwait.
Upon a more critical review Mr. Andreas Hug, General Manager Ambit Risk amp; Performance at SunGard stated: “We are pleased at the timeliness and success of the implementation of our system with Gulf Bank. Our Enterprise Risk Management solutions will enhance the Bank’s overall performance through the efficient systems now in place and will assist the Bank’s teams in making more accurate decisions while reducing risk, all in a transparent manner.”
Commenting further, he stated that the implementation at Gulf Bank was one of the fastest and the best that their team had seen in the region.
The usage of this new system by Gulf Bank, the first bank in Kuwait to have the full suite of SunGard’s solutions, will help provide a more centralized view of risk and liquidity across many of the Bank’s key functions. The multiple functions this system provides will in turn help Gulf Bank to make more informed decisions and thus maximize returns over both short-term and long-term fiscal horizons.
Overall, every aspect of this system is designed to assist Gulf Bank continue to deliver superior banking solutions and services, which are being constantly tailored to cater to the needs of its wide customer base. It reflects the success of the Bank’s disciplined business strategy across all its key business groups instilling a greater chance for future growth and prosperity throughout the consumer, corporate, international and investment banking sectors.
Enterprise Data Software Company Splunk Files For $125M IPO
Splunk, an enterprise data company; has filed its S-1 to go public. In the offering, Splunk aims to raises as much as $125 million. The company will list under the symbol SPLK.
Splunk is a provider of intelligence software used to monitor, report and analyze real-time machine data as well as terabytes of historical data-located on-premise or in the cloud. For example, Splunk indexes and makes searchable data from any app, server or network device in real-time including logs, config files, messages, and alerts. Clients can also monitor distributed deployment across thousands of servers in multiple data centers; manage the infrastructure of a cloud platform-as-a-service (PaaS); monitor performance of cloud- delivered SaaS solutions and monitor hybrid SaaS/hosted models.
Clients include Credit Suisse, Bank Of America, Comcast, Salesforce, Zynga, LinkedIn, T-Mobile, Swisscom, Shutterfly, Heroku and the US Departments of Labor and Energy. As of October 2011, the company had over 3,300 customers, including a majority of the Fortune 100.
The companys revenue comes from fees based on clients estimated indexing capacity needs. For fiscal 2009, 2010 and 2011, Splunks revenues were $18.2 million, $35 million and $66.2 million, respectively, representing year-over-year growth of 93% for 2010 and 89% growth for 2011.
In 2009, 2010, and 2011, the company took a net loss of $14.8 million, $7.5 million and $3.8 million, respectively. For the first nine months of 2011 and its fiscal year 2012, Splunks revenues were $43.5 million and $77.8 million, respectively, representing year-over-year growth of 79%. For the same period, Splunk took a net loss was $2 million and $9.7 million, respectively.
Splunk has raised $40 million in funding from August Capital, JKamp;B Capital, Ignition Partners and Sevin Rosen Funds.
Splunk has been eying a public offering for some time now, even before the IPO market for tech companies started to heat up. In 2010, Splunks CEO Godfrey Sullivan told us that the company had plans for an IPO in 2012. Considering that last year brought the public offerings of a number of consumer tech companies, this year could be the year of the enterprise IPO.
Malta Enterprise sponsors Arabic language course for business
Malta Enterprise (ME) is organising a practical introductory course to the Arabic language aimed at entrepreneurs doing business in Arabic-speaking countries or interested in expanding their business activities in the region.
The course, for which there will be no charge, is scheduled to begin on 30 January. Two-hour long sessions between 6.30 and 8.30pm will be held at the Kordin Business Incubation Centre (KBIC) every Monday and Wednesday until 27 June.
Among other things, the syllabus of the introductory course includes basic vocabulary, such as the Arabic alphabet, numbers, time and date, as well as basic grammar and sentence construction. As the participants become more fluent in Arabic, instruction will then move on to conversation and eventually to the more complex elements of the Arabic business language, focusing on subjects such as the type, set-up and aim of business, business negotiations and other related matters.
Progress will be monitored through periodic assessments, while a certificate of attendance will be provided at the end of the course to participants who attend at least 80 per cent of the sessions. The course will be delivered by Naim Dhifi, Consular officer at the Embassy of Malta in Tunisia, who also assisted ME in the formation of the course structure.
While the idea was first considered during the Libyan crisis, ME has developed the course further to cater for the needs of those wishing to conduct business not only in Libya but in the entire North African region, which is currently offering a multitude of opportunities as a result of the Arab Spring.
Indeed, businesses participating in two delegations to Tunisia in the past year reported good prospects for business, while there has been an overwhelming interest from local enterprises to participate in the business delegation to Libya in the coming months.
The Arabic language course complements the assistance already being provided by ME, which includes on-the-ground assistance in Libya through the Commercial Office in Tripoli.
Bookings for the course will be accepted until Wednesday, 25 January. Only one applicant per company will be accepted as places are limited, although additional participants may be considered, subject to availability.
Further details may be obtained by contacting ME on 2542 0000 or via email on info@maltaenterprise.com
Romney Free-Enterprise ‘Trial’ Aligns Republicans With Obama
(Adds national unemployment rate and job-creation numbers starting in fourth paragraph under Hard Times subhead. For more campaign news, see ELECT.)
Jan. 12 (Bloomberg) — Republican front-runner Mitt Romney, who has cast the 2012 presidential campaign as free enterprise on trial, finds himself in a struggle over the role of capitalism in an unlikely place: within his own party.
As Romney attempts to frame a general election contest with President Barack Obama on the economy, some of his rivals for the Republican nomination have made many of the same arguments against him that Democrats have.
Texas Governor Rick Perry accused Romney of practicing vulture capitalism during his days as a private equity executive. A film bankrolled by supporters of former House Speaker Newt Gingrich charges that Romneys firm, Bain Capital LLC, eliminated jobs and turned the misfortune of others into their own enormous financial gain. These are complaints the Obama campaign will be ready to reinforce during the campaign.
Weve understood for a long time that the Obama people would come after free enterprise, Romney told reporters aboard his campaign plane yesterday during a flight to South Carolina, site of the next primary. Little surprised to see Newt Gingrich as the first witness for the prosecution.
With the US economy the dominant concern of voters, Obama heads into Novembers election seeking to portray himself as a champion of middle-income Americans who is confronting Wall Street and Republican obstructionists in Congress. The president signaled his re-election message with a Dec. 6 address in Kansas, saying the nation is at a make-or-break moment for the middle class.
Market-Oriented
Kent Hughes, director of the Program on Science, Technology, America and the Global Economy at The Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, dismissed Romneys portrayal of Obama as political hyperbole.
I dont really see free enterprise being put on trial by any of the candidates, including President Obama, he said. The president looks, as previous administrations have, for business to play a leading role in everything from job-creation to long-term productivity growth.
Republican criticism of Romneys business record could prove damaging if it depresses enthusiasm for the partys eventual nominee among the white working class.
Obama is never going to convince those white working- class voters to stay home rather than vote for Romney, said Dan Schnur, a campaign adviser to Republican presidential candidate John McCains first bid for the White House in 2000. Some of that rhetoric from Gingrich and Perry can.
Key to Victory
White working-class voters have become increasingly important in the Republican electoral coalition, said Ruy Teixeira, a political demographer and senior fellow at the Center for American Progress in Washington.
A Republican nominee literally cant win without a very large supermajority from the white working class, Teixeira said. Its the key to their victory. The stakes couldnt be higher.
Republicans succeeded in the 2010 midterm congressional elections by gaining a 30-percentage-point lead among white working-class voters, Teixeira said. Obama won election in 2008 even with an 18-point gap among those voters because of support from minority groups and college-educated whites.
Seizing the Moment
Romney seized his moment before a national television audience on the night of his New Hampshire primary victory to define his differences with the Democratic president in terms of fundamental economic principles, portraying Obama as a practitioner of the bitter politics of envy who would turn America into a European-style entitlement society.
This president takes his inspiration from the capitals of Europe, Romney told his supporters.
Romney promised instead to lead us down a different path, where we are lifted up by our desire to succeed, not dragged down by a resentment of success.
For now, it is Romneys Republican rivals who are stoking resentment and providing recorded comments that Democrats could turn against Romney should he become the partys nominee.
Rapid Data Management System (RDMS) by GRT Released for Android Operating System
RDMS on Android OS will lead us to more Enterprise Mobile Field-Data Workflow Solution opportunities which decrease costs and improve profits for our clients.
Is system of free enterprise above criticism?
Its not easy being a presidential candidate.
Just ask Mitt Romney who was targeted this week as a heartless guy who likes firing people and was called a vulture capitalist and thats by people in his own political party.
The charges concern Romneys earlier career running a venture capital operation called Bain Capital. Basically, the goal of Bain was to find and acquire distressed companies that could be either turned around and made more profitable or sold off for a profit.
Critics claim this involved laying off workers and putting long-term companies out of business to make a big profit.
Romney says they did their best to help struggling companies and as a private equity company also formed new businesses and created thousands of jobs.
How one sees this kind of venture capitalism depends on your place in the equation.
If you are a worker for a company that is taken over and put out of business, then you arent going to have a very positive view. That is where much of the criticism of Romneys tenure at Bain Capital is focused.
On the other hand, many are defending venture capitalism as simply part of the free enterprise system in which there are always winners and losers.
In fact, Jon Huntsman one of Romneys challengers in the presidential nomination race came to his defense, referring to the process as creative destruction … which has always been part of capitalism.
Free enterprise is a good thing. It is the foundation of our country. There is a reason that even communist nations have moved toward free enterprise. It works. It brings prosperity.
Free enterprise or capitalism works because it provides the ability for people with ambition to improve their lot in life. If you know what you are doing and work hard at it, the opportunity exists to prosper and even become wealthy. It is an enticing incentive and the core of our free society.
But the reality is that there is also the opportunity to fail. Businesses come and go all the time. It truly is survival of the fittest or perhaps the most aggressive or even meanest in free enterprise.
The question is whether even in the fiercely fought world of free enterprise there are lines that should not be crossed. Are there boundaries to capitalistic conduct?
Defenders of Romney seem to be saying no to that question. Everything is acceptable if it is free enterprise. Capitalism is above criticism.
Im not convinced that is true. If it was, then business schools wouldnt have classes in business ethics.
At one time, business monopolies were acceptable in our country, the bastion of free enterprise. But it was decided that was an unfair practice and we now have laws against monopolistic behavior. We also have laws against unfair treatment of workers and requirements to meet contractual obligations. Capitalism is not without constraints.
I think many people hope for fair play and decency even when the banner of free enterprise is flying.
Defenders of Mitt Romney say those attacking his work at Bain Capital are actually attacking the free enterprise system.
But are they really? Maybe his critics are just trying to explore the boundaries of what is ethical conduct in the business world.
It is an issue many of us will have to decide for ourselves in the months ahead as the presidential election heats up.
Terry Ross is director of the Yuma Suns News and Information Center. Email: tross@yumasun.com. Telephone: 539-6870. Facebook: facebook.com/YSTerryRoss. Twitter: twitter.com/@YSTerryRoss.
Enterprise Leads the Car Rental Market with its First Ever Sustainability Report
The car rental market is one market that is constantly getting greener, offering a growing number of green services from the newest electric cars to car sharing programs. Yet surprisingly, none of the major car rental companies, until now, have published a sustainability report. Well, that was true until last week when Enterprise Holdings (which owns and operates Alamo, Enterprise Rent-A-Car and National Car brands) took the lead and announced the release of its first ever sustainability report.
If you have followed TriplePundit for a while this news shouldn’t come as a surprise to you – reports on Enterprise’s commitment to sustainability and green initiatives date back to 2008 and 2009. This year you could also read here how Enterprise is the first to offer Chevy Volts for rent and is rolling out the largest EV rental fleet in service. It also makes sense that as the leading rental car company in the world (measured by revenue, employees and fleet,) Enterprise also leads this market when it comes to sustainability reporting.
Here are some of the report’s highlights:
- 20/20 Vision Program: Hit the 4 percent target for energy usage reduction as part of the companys five-year program, designed to reduce overall energy consumption by 20 percent in its network of branches.
- Enterprise Sustainable Construction Protocol (ESCP): Launched a new industry-leading effort to make all newly constructed and retrofitted rental locations sustainable during the next five years. Enterprise began investing more than $150 million in sustainable construction through the use of these new guidelines.
- Electric Vehicles: Took delivery of more than 150 full EVs, including more Nissan Leafs than any other rental operator. In addition, Enterprise was the first company to rent the plug-in hybrid electric Chevy Volt.
- 50 Million Tree Pledge: Funded the addition of one million trees to national forests in countries where Enterprise operates as part of its private/public/nonprofit partnership with the Arbor Day Foundation and the US Forest Service.
- Electrification Coalition: Joined this nonpartisan, not-for-profit group of business leaders representing the entire value chain of the growing electric-vehicle industry.
- National Clean Fleets Partnership: Became a corporate member of this public-private partnership, which was established to help large companies reduce diesel and gasoline use in their fleets by incorporating electric vehicles, alternative fuels, and fuel-saving measures into their daily operations.
Besides the 20/20 vision’s goal mentioned above, Enterprise includes in this report couple of interesting goals: reducing its Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions by 10 percent by 2015, converting all airport shuttle buses in its fleet to B20 biodiesel by 2015 and increasing participation in its annual Enterprise Holdings health assessment to 10,000 employees companywide by 2015.
Looking at the company’s carbon footprint reduction goal, it seems reasonable at first given these are the company’s first steps in calculating and managing its carbon emissions. Yet, it’s important to note that this goal relates only to Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions, which represent only 3 percent of the company’s overall impact. The rest, 97 percent, are Scope 3 emissions generated mainly from the cars as Enterprise’s customers drive them. If you do the math, you find that the company’s goal equals a 0.3 percent reduction, which doesn’t seem to be too challenging, to say the least.
Enterprise is not the first company that has made big commitments for small sections of their footprint. We also see this pattern in other companies reports, like Timberland and Vodafone. I have to say I’m not a big fan of these sorts of goals, as they might lead to a misrepresentation of the company’s efforts to reduce its overall impact. Yet, I do have to commend Enterprise for being fully transparent, giving clear and detailed explanations about their decision not to include Scope 3 in their goal for now (it’s seems they just don’t have the information now), and committing in their goals for the next report to “establish a baseline for Scope 3 emissions within our supply chain. Other indirect emissions such as fuels, transport-related activities – and, in our specific case, the GHG emissions of our cars as our customers drive them.”
It was also encouraging to read in the report on their chairman’s task force – a cross-functional group of 15 department heads and subject-matter experts that is at the core of Enterprise’s sustainability effort. Founded last year, the task force identified priorities for Enterprise’s sustainability program and it transcends individual departments to bring a full-scope approach to important issues and makes addressing them a responsibility of the entire company. Creating such a senior governing body not only helps to integrate sustainability in the company in a strategic way, but also ensures the company’s commitment to this process on all levels and throughout all of its operations.
With a fleet of more than 1.2 million cars and trucks, Enterprise has the power to push the transportation space forward and make it more sustainable. It is becoming more important as we see a growing demand for SUVs and light trucks. This trend means that without a gas tax or similar economic incentives, we need the help of companies like Enterprise to make the market greener. Therefore, this report is very important, providing a clear indication that sustainability has become an essential part of Enterprise’s DNA.
Raz Godelnik is the co-founder of Eco-Libris, a green company working to green up the book industry in the digital age. He is also an adjunct professor in the University of Delaware’s Alfred Lerner College of Business and Economics.
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IBS Launches Enterprise Vertical Leadership Program
STOCKHOLM, Nov 04, 2011 (BUSINESS WIRE) –
International Business Systems (IBS), a global leading integrated ERP
and supply chain provider, today announced the launch of its Enterprise
Vertical Leadership Program (EVLP) that provides industry-leading
companies with direct input into IBS product development cycles.
The program provides customers with influence into product developments
with much faster time to market. Customers share in the development
costs, with the objective being to create and install a standard version
of the vertical solution for council members. The time and cost of
upgrading for companies using standard solutions are much reduced, thus
enabling them to deploy more readily the next generation of IBS products.
Rexel, one of the largest electrical suppliers in Europe is the first
member of this program, and as the program’s anchor customer for the
electrical goods vertical, Rexel’s CIO, Olivier Baldassari, becomes
council chairman.
“This program provides Rexel with a direct line into the product
development cycles which allows for much faster deployment and response
to market demands, product prioritization, more dedicated functionality
for less cost and gives us the ability to make certain functionalities
standard,” said Baldassari . “We are indeed delighted to be a founding
member in the Enterprise Vertical Leadership Program with IBS.”
As a part of the company’s commitment to a customer-focused realignment,
the EVLP is designed for industry leaders in verticals with global
footprints. Vertical solutions developed through the program will be
marketed through the IBS partner and direct sales channel.
“Our customers will work with a dedicated core product development team
well versed in each industry with a strong product and program
management who will drive the vertical development and its rollout with
development and deployment resources,” said Pallab Chatterjee, chairman
of the board of IBS. “With two- to three-year global roadmaps
established for each customer and a stringent quality process, members
of the council are guaranteed the ability to drive enhancements and have
direct input into release plans for their solution”.
The announcement of the EVLP formalizes how IBS has already been working
with top companies in key industries to co-develop functionality,
enhancements and solutions specific to their industries, including Cramo
in the rental vertical and PaperLinx in the paper vertical.
IBS in brief
Stockholm-based International Business Systems (IBS) is a leading global
integrated ERP and supply chain provider. Thousands of customers in over
40 countries rely on IBS for world-class solutions to drive dramatic
improvements in their operations. IBS operates Dynaman, an advanced
warehouse management solution and Bookmaster, a leader in ERP technology
for publishing. For more information, contact
www.ibs.net .
This information was brought to you by Cision
http://www.cisionwire.com
SOURCE: IBS
IBS AB
Mark Illidge
VP IBS Field Operations & Corporate Marketing
+ 44 777 195 42 73
Mark.illidge@ibs.net
Copyright Business Wire 2011
Stanford snags record $150 million donation for poverty center
By John A. Byrne, contributor
(Poetsamp;Quants) — Stanfords Graduate School of Business has long been one of the few business schools in the world that has regularly turned out its fair share of social entrepreneurs. Now it may well become the B-school for global social enterprise.
An unprecedented $150 million gift — the largest in the business schools history — will be used to create a new institute whose goal is to combat poverty around the world. The money and the new Stanford Institute for Innovation in Developing Economies propels the B-school — a place better known for producing investment bankers, consultants, and entrepreneurs — into the forefront of a growing movement to alleviate poverty through non-profit and for-profit social enterprises.
A key component of the effort will be what Stanford is calling an on-the-ground initiative to help social entrepreneurs develop organizations that make products and services to help the poor. Its not just a think tank. Its going to transform lives, said Robert E. King, a 1960 Stanford Business School alum, who made the gift with his wife, Dorothy.
The institute will teach and support students to create organizations similar to one launched by Daniel Spitzer, a Stanford MBA, who started a venture that grows hazelnut trees in Bhutan. The for-profit company, Mountain Hazelnut Venture Ltd., hopes to produce some 40,000 tons of hazelnuts, giving local farmers a lucrative export product and restoring trees to mountainsides stripped by logging.
More than a billion people live on less than $1.25 a day, said King. Thats just not right. King, 76, is the founder of Peninsula Capital in Menlo Park, Calif., and an early investor in Chinese Internet search company Baidu (BIDU).
The gift is among the largest ever for a business school and the biggest since David Booth gave $300 million in 2008 to what is now known as University of Chicago Booth School of Business. In 2006, Stanfords business school received a $105 million gift from Nike Inc. (NKE) co-founder Philip Knight to help construct its new campus, which formally opened earlier this year.
The extraordinary size of the gift and its support of a purpose generally not considered in the mainstream of business school study should help establish Stanford as the worlds leading business school for social enterprise. For years, US News rankings of the best business schools for non-profits have put Yale Universitys School of Management first and Stanford second. The gift stands to make the school the undisputed world leader in this area.
Hau Lee, a Stanford professor who teaches supply chain management and was named the leader of the new institute, concedes the size and ambition of the gift is a little overwhelming. But the school is already searching for three new faculty members with deep expertise in developing economies to scale up its efforts in this area. Lee said he hopes to have them on board as early as next September.
The majority of our graduates and most business schools will focus on consulting firms and multinational companies, but the entrepreneurial spirit we try to instill in our students can steer some — a small percentage — to work with local entrepreneurs for the betterment of the under-served economies, says Lee. That trend is happening. In the last couple of years, we have seen our own graduates go to India and other countries to build companies in irrigation systems and water purification. We hope this accelerates.
The idea for the gift apparently came out of home stays that the founding donors have offered to international students at Stanford for more than four decades. They witnessed first-hand the impact that education and entrepreneurship can have at both an individual level and a larger scale. One student, Xiangmin Cui, PhD 97, introduced King to his friend Eric Xu, who joined web engineer Robin Li to launch a Chinese-language search engine.
After that meeting, King provided seed funding to Baidu, which now employs more than 10,000 people in China. Another King home-stay student — Andreata Muforo from Zimbabwe, who graduated with an MBA from Stanford in 2009 — brought peers from her global study trip to Africa to the Kings home for dinner. We heard how those first-hand experiences compelled some of the MBAs to return for internships in Africa, said Dottie King. We saw the direct connection between the learning experience and the motivation to make change.
We believe that innovation and entrepreneurship are the engines of growth to lift people out of poverty, added King in a statement.
Of the $150 million gift, $100 million will fund the Institute. The remaining $50 million will be used to match other donors who contribute still more money to fuel Stanfords commitment to alleviating poverty, bringing the total philanthropic investment to potentially $200 million.
More from Poetsamp;Quants:
- Social Entrepreneurship: The Best B-Schools and Programs
- Handicapping Your Odds Of Getting Into a Top MBA Program
- Why Its Easier To Get Into A Top Business School Now
