December 20, 2019. Shanghai – From fashion and sustainability to finance and mountaineering, CEIBS students and alumni shared a variety of personal interests and stories with us this year. Here are some of our favourites from the past 12 months.

At the beginning of the year, MBA Admissions sat down with MBA2020’s Francesco Cartoni and Jose Urrutia to learn how a chance meeting at a BBQ in Santiago started the pair on a journey of brotherhood and led them to take the China challenge together.

Fellow MBA2020 Mathieu Tse also shared with us his journey from his beginnings in Hong Kong to growing up in French Guiana, studying in Europe and China, and telling us how his experience helped him develop a strong thirst for knowledge, combat sports and entrepreneurship.

This year, we caught up with CEIBS GEMBA alumnus Gary Xiong to hear about his company Little Dragon Bus. In sharing his story with us, he also challenged us to ask the question, is bus sharing really the next big thing?

Earlier this year, Christoph Flink (CEIBS GEMBA2009), Mario Mazzocca (GEMBA2009), Sophia Jiao (GEMBA2018) and Mario Feuerstein (GEMBA2009) took on one of the world’s most spectacular challenges and climbed Mount Kilimanjaro. In this piece, Christoph shared his first-hand account of his experience during their adventure.

On the long list of impressive CEIBS alumni who are helping bring China and the West closer together, MBA2016’s Saken Shayakhmetov stands out. This year, Saken told us how his experience at CEIBS led him to a position at the office of Kazakhstan’s Prime Minister and the opportunity to work on projects that have positively impacted the lives of others.

Originally from Denmark, social entrepreneur and GEMBA2015 alumnus Nikolaj Moesgaard left his homeland roughly 20 years ago in search of new opportunities. In May of this year, Nikolaj spoke with us about how his experience at CEIBS reignited his curiosity to learn and grow and what he is doing to work for a sustainable future.

When vivo’s Seon Hwang moved to Shanghai from his native Korea to do an MBA in 2010, he did so with his mid-to-long term sights set on developing his career in China by helping a Chinese company go global. In 2019, he shed some light on how he is doing just that.

Born and raised in India, MBA2020’s Ketan Arora’s interest in China led him to develop a liking for internet start-ups. In this story, Ketan shared with us how a part-time internship at ByteDance helped him discover what makes the tech company Tik.

MBA2021’s Neil Flynn also took some time in 2019 to reflect on his seven year experience in China. Here, he talks about how being in the right place at the right time in history influenced his journey from working in finance in the UK to studying at CEIBS.

Mayuko Kawata’s pre-MBA life was a self-described atypical one. After moving around a lot as a child, she started career as a stylist doing hair and makeup for models at Los Angeles Fashion Week. In this story, she talked about her career in fashion and how an MBA at CEIBS is helping her design her own runway.

For more CEIBS student and alumni stories, visit our CEIBS Stories page here.