Jenny Kwan, MBA '09

AdMIT Weekend coming up!

AdMIT weekend is coming up at the end of this week!  It's an exciting time and the email lists are buzzing with opportunities to get involved.  I remember what a huge impression my AdMIT weekend made on me last year - all the friendly people and so much activity!  Everyone at MIT Sloan is looking forward to welcoming the newly admitted students - we hope you see what we have to offer and have a great time!

Spring Start

It may not feel like it at the time, but they really ease you into the Core semester.  The new semester just started two weeks ago and already it's full on into everything.

New Co-Presidents from the Class of 2009 are being s/elected for the various clubs and we've already had some really exceptional speakers - even considering the usual top notch people we get to see.  Here's the rundown:

Gideon Gartner of the Gartner Group talked to the E&I crew about his life, how he started working for IBM so many years ago before moving to Wall Street and then starting up not one, but three successful companies.

Ellen Kullman, EVP Dupont, talked to a small group from SWIM (Sloan Women in Management) over breakfast before her many other engagements that day.  We had a really open and candid discussion about life, her family, her career, the choices she has made to get there and how she manages everything within a 24 hour day.

Jet Li, yes, the international film star, spoke at MIT this evening as part of the China Development Initiative.  He talked about his life (being 11 years old visiting America for the first time as part of a cultural exchange and then subsequently shaking hands with several Presidents), his philosophy (life until now is a dream, enjoy the present) and his new foundation and the impact he wants to have on the world.

IAP Adventures - China

So, the whole of MIT gets January off for IAP (Independent Activities Period) – and while most of my class are currently up to their knees in snow and stressing about IB and consulting recruiting, yours truly was lounging around in the sun in the Philippines :-D

Well, actually it was just 5 days off holidaying and the rest of the time been pretty hard out on an independent research project on clean energy entrepreneurship in China.  We've met all kinds of really interesting people in Beijing and Shanghai about the challenges and opportunities for VCs and Entrepreneurs in the clean energy space in China. 

It was an amazing opportunity to really learn about the intersection of three things I really wanted to explore while at MIT.  Biggest learnings for me was the reach of the MIT network and the value of talking to people on the ground where the action's happening!

Silicon Valley

Wow, as a classmate said, our whirlwind tour of the valley included a Disneyworld like array of companies.  It's a well known fact that over 95% of startups fail and that being an entrepreneur is inherently risky.  The companies that we visited 1-5 Jan 2008 as part of the Entrepreneurship and Innovation program were all at the cutting (and sometimes bleeding) edge of their respective fields and looking like the ones that would make it big.

Some were already pretty big - the biggest (by far!) company we saw was Google.  Well on their way were VMWare and Salesforce.com.  Others were small and under the radar but already those in the know were talking about them - Nanosolar and Amyris to name just a couple.

Definite highlight was the MIT Reception in the Carnelian Room with amazing views over San Francisco.  It was also really great to get to know my classmates a little better - all in all a pretty good way to start 2008!