May 27, 2023. Shanghai – Inspired by the theme of Beyond, TEDxCEIBS 2023 was held at CEIBS Shanghai Campus by MBA students today. Exploring topics such as rural revitalization, innovative elderly care, economic transformation, aerospace, international e-sports and rare diseases, the event featured a feast of cutting-edge ideas from seasoned experts, millennials and Gen-Zs alike.

CEIBS Vice President and Dean Professor Frank Bournois and Associate Dean and MBA Director Professor Shameen Prashantham were joined in a packed conference centre by over a live audience and over a million views via online streaming platforms. Read on for takeaways from this year’s speakers.

From crowded city streets to the future of farming

Xingyu Wang, Founder of Beyond the City

Before founding social enterprise Beyond the City, millennial Xingyu Wang could have never imagined himself being involved with rural revitalization. Today, he has become a new generation of farmer with a foot in more than 200 villages. He has introduced 30,000 urban children to the countryside, whilst sponsoring more than 1,000 rural children to visit cities.

Wang believes that urban-rural inequality is one of the main causes of rural poverty. By attracting talented people to join his rural revitalization team and enhancing agricultural modernization, he hopes to narrow the gap between urban and rural areas and bring the two areas closer to each other.

The road to energy liberalisation

Henry Cheung, Global Energy Storage and Microgrid Solutions Lead for Sinexcel Inc

During his talk, Henry introduced the dangers of power shortages and the prospects for energy storage development through various case studies and data.

He argued that the root cause of the energy crises comes from the imbalance between production and use. In his view, energy storage can be a useful addition to electricity to help reduce peaks and valleys, lower the risk of interruptions and peak costs, as well as reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. In his words, the road to energy freedom is a road of trade-offs, and also one full of options.

What can a pea do?

Yiwei Chen, Founder of Wonder Sir

In a speech on rare diseases, Dr. Yiwei Chen pointed out that the global population of rare diseases ranges from 263 million to 446 million, while only 10% of the world’s 6,172 rare diseases have medication and treatments available. A lack of medicines and a high mortality rate of patients with rare diseases have prompted her to put aside her profession as a researcher in the hopes of saving more families with rare diseases through science education.

Through a decade of hard work, Dr. Chen has gradually realized her dream of founding Wonder Sir – a rare disease science education platform. So far, she has worked with dozens of rare disease clinical experts and served nearly 100 rare disease organisations across China.

The power of caring: Aging isn’t as scary as you imagine

Xingqun Yang, Co-founder of the Double Respect Dignity Healthcare Management

Xingqun Yang’s story began with the unexpected death of an elderly patient. Self-blame and introspection made her realize the importance of professional management and refined operations in the aging industry. She said that the elderly care industry requires love, patience and care. Only with good health, can elders enjoy a happy later life.

As a veteran dedicated to the industry for over decades, Yang believes that community-based nursing, smart elderly care and elderly care with dignity will be more suitable with the development trend of aging in China than the current reform of the industry.

Beyond the era of markets

Jonathan Woetzel, Director of McKinsey Global Institute

In a keynote speech entitled Market Drives Force, Jonathan Woetzel presented data to reveal the underlying forces that drive market development. In McKinsey’s research framework, drivers are inextricably linked to historic events in time, such as the founding of the United Nations, the end of World War II and the birth of the World Wide Web.

Looking back on the history, Dr. Woetzel noted that the world may face a new round of changes. The COVID-19 pandemic, Russia-Ukraine conflict, energy crisis and the emergence of AI technology, as well as global multi-polarity, aging and highly indebted development, will all be important factors influencing the future development of the world.

Drama is the light

Tong Luo, Director, Scholar of Greek Drama, Expert in residence of Shanghai Theatre Academy

What is drama? What does drama mean to modern people? During her speech, Prof. Luo Tong gave an insightful and detailed explanation of Greek drama. She believes that drama can arouse sympathy and be admired by people from different backgrounds, which offers the possibility for ordinary people to come into the theatre and gain comfort for their souls and heal their wounds.

When aerospace technology goes into business

Song Yao, Co-founder and Co-CEO of Orienspace

In his speech, Song Yao painted an optimistic picture of the future of commercial spaceflight. He presented the history of the satellite industry, from the birth of the aircraft and the first manned space landing on the moon to the subsequent slowdown of deep space exploration activities and starlink satellite launches.

As for the prospects of the commercial satellite industry, Yao believes that it is feasible to reduce the cost of commercial satellite launches with technological upgrades and increased number of commercial launch vehicle recycles. What he, and Orienspace, want to do is to help commercial satellite companies deliver satellites into designated orbits at low cost, similar to sending express deliveries.

Beyond the game

Yibo Jin, Co-CEO of Tencent E-sports, Deputy GM of Tencent K6 Club

In people’s stereotypes, there is little difference between e-sports players and internet addicts. But for Yibo Jin, he believes e-sports are not only an emerging industry, but also an area where competitors can compete for the glory for the country.

In contrast with people’s perception that e-sports players can easily make money, players have to tolerate rigorous and tedious training for more than 12 hours every day. As the industry now becomes more mature and professional, Chinese e-sports are developing towards a higher level. After 20 years of development, the e-sports industry is no longer what it used to be. Not only has it been included in the Asian Games, but it has also become an important window for the world to understand China.

Now in its 10th year, TEDxCEIBS 2023 looks back at the past and looks forward to the future. Bringing together TED spirit with CEIBS’ mission to educate responsible leaders versed in “China Depth, Global Breadth,” the TEDxCEIBS series aims to become one of China’s most influential platforms for spreading innovative ideas to the public.