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Catching The Entrepreneurship Bug While On Exchange At SAIF

After MBA classes at Shanghai's SAIF, Anders Lassen hopes to set up a company taking Chinese goods to Europe

Wed Jan 25 2012

BusinessBecause

Anders Høst Lassen signed up for what he thought would be a simple MBA exchange programme to the Shanghai Advanced Institute of Finance(SAIF) but ended up discovering a lifetime of business opportunity in China.

The Danish national completed his Bsc. International Business at Copenhagen Business School 2009 and worked as a Mergers & Acquisition analyst at Deloitte in Copenhagen before signing on for a Master in Finance and Accounting also at the Copenhagen Business School.

Anders had always known he wanted to be an entrepreneur so he opted to learn more about the globalised business world by taking MBA courses at the Shanghai Advanced Institute of Finance(SAIF) on an exchange programme.

Anders has been taking SAIF MBA courses since 2011. He left Deloitte to travel and discover the world and was particularly interested in China because he suspected that there was a lot of stereotyping about Chinese businessmen and investors. “From working with the Chinese, I could tell this wasn’t true but I wanted to have the experience for myself”.

Copenhagen Business School recommended SAIF to Anders and he has been delighted with the experience. “Copenhagen Business School recommended SAIF because of its top rated programme and international faculty. Studying at SAIF has been the best way to understand Chinese cultural references and corporate frameworks. I have had some really good classes especially commercial banking. SAIF teachers are also very experienced in communicating their messages very clearly.”

For Anders it has been very easy to live in Shanghai. “SAIF has made big efforts to accommodate foreign students. I was quite surprised by the level of help they gave me. The International Office want you to succeed so they are very helpful even with bureaucratic affairs.” Anders has complemented his efforts to understand the local culture by learning to speak Chinese. His advice to foreign students studying in China is to "Really spend time with the Chinese community. Its very easy to go out just with the expat community.”

Anders is already using the knowledge gained from his classes at SAIF to explore business opportunities in China, specifically the potential to source products in China to sell in Europe. He will spend the rest of the year in China preparing his business and attending classes at SAIF. He realises that setting up on his own in a foreign country will be a lot of hard work but he is very keen on the idea. “The greatest satisfaction comes from doing something for yourself.” 

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