China advisory board

Co-Chairmen

Shi Dinghuan
China Society for Renewable Energy

Shi Dinghuan a native of Qing Yuan, Hebei, born in Kunming, Yunnan in Sep., 1943. He is a party member of the Communist Party of China and a Counselor of the State Council.

He graduated from the Engineering Physics Department, Tsinghua University in July 1967, majoring in radiation dosimetry and protection. He had worked in Diatomaceous Yard of Jiaohe County, Jilin, County Industrial Bureau and a county paper mill. Mr. Shi had worked in the Nuclear Energy Technology Institute of Tsinghua University since November 1973. In October 1980, he joined the State Commission of Science and Technology (the former of Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST)). He was once appointed as the Deputy Division Chief of the Forecasting Bureau, Deputy Director of the Industrial Technology Bureau, Director of the Department of Industrial Science and Technology. He then moved to take up the position as the Deputy Director-General of the High and New Technology Department and Industrial Department (directorate grade). In June 1988, he also acted as a member of the “Torch Programme” Office. Mr. Shi took the office of the Secretary General of MOST in August 2001, he moved to the position of the Party Committee member in November the same year. Since June 2003, he has been a member of the Mid- and Long Term Project Planning Office for National Science and Technology Development and the leader of the Strategic Research Group. In March 2004, Mr. Shi was appointed as the Counselor of the State Council.

Mr. Shi has long been responsible for the research and formulation of strategies and policies for energy, science and technology management, and technology development. He has taken part in the implementation of the Seventh Five-Year-Plan of national economy and the Plan of Technology Development 2000. Mr. Shi has also contributed to the formulation of technology programmes and the implementation of key technology projects in hi-tech areas for the Eighth, Ninth and Tenth Five-Year-Plans. He has been taking part in various hi-tech industrialisation programmes, such as High & New Technology Industries Development Zones, enterprise incubation, Productivity Centers and technology and innovation engineering.

Mr. Shi also serves as the Chairman of the China Technology Advisory Association, China Society for Scientific and Technical Information, Chinese Solar Energy Society and China Association of Productivity Promotion Centers.

Maurice Strong
Cosmos International, Inc.

Maurice Strong, a Canadian, was born and educated in Canada. He has been working at senior levels for over 30 years in business, government and international organizations and now spends most of his time in China.

Current appointments include: Chairman of Cosmos International Group; Honorary Professor of Peking University (Beijing), Tongji University (Shanghai), and Environmental Management College of China; Honorary Board Chairman of Peking University Environment Fund; Honorary President, Oriental Environment Research Institute (China); Special Senior Advisor of China International Institute of Multinational Corporations, Co-founder and Chairman Emeritus of the Earth Council Alliance; Member of United States National Academy of Science; Vice-Chairman, Chicago Climate Exchange; Visiting Professor University of Ottawa (Canada); Member of Korean Academy of Science and Technology. Chairman, International Advisory Board, CH2M HILL Companies.

Some of Mr. Strong’s past appointments include: Under Secretary General and Special Advisor to the Secretary General of the United Nations; Senior Advisor to the President World Bank and member of management committee; Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Ontario Hydro; Director, Member, International Advisory Board, Toyota Motor Corporation; Founder and first Co-Chair of the Canada-China Business Council; Member, Foundation Board, World Economic Forum; Secretary-General of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (Earth Summit); First Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme; first President of the Canadian International Development Agency and Deputy Minister, Foreign Affairs; Secretary-General of the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment (1972); Chairman of the Stockholm Environment Institute; Member and Chairman of the Executive Committee of the United Nations Foundation; Chairman of the World Resources Institute; Vice Chairman, World Wildlife Fund International; Member, International Advisory Board, Federation of Korean Industries; Chairman, Executive Bureau World Conservation Union (IUCN); Trustee, Rockefeller Foundation; President, Power Corporation of Canada; Chairman and President, Petro Canada; Chairman, Canada Development Investment Corporation; Vice Chairman, Tosco Corporation;

Mr. Strong is a Member of the Queen’s Privy Council for Canada.

Honors he has received include Companion of the Order of Canada, the Swedish Royal Order of the Polar Star, the Brazilian National Order of the Southern Cross, and Public Welfare Medal, the Highest Honour of the U.S. National Academy of Science, Tyler Environmental Prize, Blue Planet Prize and 53 honorary doctorate degrees.

The Board

Peter Corne
Eversheds

Peter Corne joined Eversheds in 2006, and is the Managing Director of the Shanghai office. He has been based in Shanghai since 1996, working first at Simmons & Simmons from 1996 to 2000, and then at Linklaters from 2000 to 2006. Qualified to practice in England & Wales, Hong Kong, New South Wales and Victoria, he has specialised in the area of Chinese corporate, commercial and regulatory practice for many years, and more recently in the area of global warming and renewable energy, which encompasses areas ranging from wind, biomass, biofuels and hydro, to energy saving, cleaner coal and geothermal. He acted for a Japanese consortium in 2005 in the largest Clean Development Mechanism Project (under the Kyoto Protocol) in the world to that time in Zhejiang Province, and for Mitsui & Co in a CDM Project involving the capture of coal bed methane gases in North China. Most recently, he acted for Anshan Iron and Steel in one of the largest CDM Projects of 2008, an energy conservation project generating 13 Million tonnes of carbon credits worth EURO 150 Million. In addition to his expertise in CDM and renewable energy, is recognised as a leading practitioner in the fields of mergers and acquisitions, corporate restructuring, and equity and asset acquisitions of foreign-invested enterprises and State-owned enterprises.

Peter has acted for a number of major corporate clients such as Coca-Cola, Hershey, SPX, MeadWestVaco, Tetrapak, Mitsui & Co, Itochu, Marubeni, Alcatel, Syngenta, Sumitomo Chemical, Asahi Chemical, Intel, Toshiba and BOC Gases (now Linde Group). He is, in addition, a noted authority on PRC administrative law and the foreign investment process, having authored a critically acclaimed book on the subject. He is listed in International Who’s Who of Professionals, and Euromoney’s Asia Leading Lawyers.

A dual national (Australia and UK) and a fluent speaker of Chinese and Japanese, Peter holds a BA and LLB from the University of Sydney and an LLM in Chinese law from the University of Melbourne. He won several scholarships for study in China and Japan, including scholarships from both the Australian and Japanese governments.

Peter has authored a number of articles and chapters on PRC investment law, and has also written extensively on the Japanese legal system. He is a regular speaker on PRC corporate legal issues, and heads the EU Chamber of Commerce legal committee in Shanghai.

Pierre duPont
Two Sigma Investments

A graduate of Princeton University (B.Sc.E), Pierre started his career at Bolt, Beranek & Newman (BBN) as a research scientist and software engineer in computational linguistics, parallel processing, and statistical data analysis. In 1990 Pierre was the founding Marketing Director of Division Limited, a realtime computer graphics hardware and virtual prototyping software company in England, which went public and was later acquired by HP and PTC. In 1996 Pierre was asked by the World Economic Forum to run WELCOM, a video-conferencing service for the Forum’s members, which was subsequently sold. In 1998 he cofounded the Zephyr Document Exchange, a secure online repository for managing collaborations for M&A and IPO transactions, which was bought in 2000 by Intralinks, a financial services integrator. In the early 2000s, Pierre built a consulting practice helping large companies achieve rapid growth through embracing externally-sourced technology for their own products (www.psdupont.com and www.yet2.com.) His clients included multinational chemicals, electronics, materials, and life-sciences companies based in the US and Japan, such as GE, P&G, Fuji Film, Kraft, DuPont, Canon, Ricoh, Johns Manville and SC Johnson.

Pierre now runs a “clean energy” private & public investing effort within Two Sigma Investments. The primary private investment target is solar generation, with occasional investments in other types of renewable production, distribution, storage and utilization, with a focus on cross-over investment opportunities in the public sector. He is also responsible for developing Two Sigma’s strategies for entering the asset management and public markets in China. Pierre provides guidance to two Boston-based companies he helped co-found, and has held board positions at three early-stage technology companies in the Boston area. He is also a partner in an investment-banking firm (www.occompartners.com) which provides advice to the owners/executives of privately-held middle-market companies on growth financings, recapitalizations, and exit strategies.

Brett Morris
Neo Technology Ventures

Brett Morris, Executive Director, Neo Technology Ventures, has a background in earth sciences and business consulting. He joined the predecessor to Neo Ventures in 2001 with a focus on investing in early stage Australian companies with innovative technologies, and the capability of expanding into global markets. Prior to Neo, Brett founded three strategy and business development firms through which he accrued broad-based experience spanning more than forty different industries, working with hundreds of different businesses ranging from small technology start-ups to global Fortune 50 corporations. Three decades of significant management consulting, corporate turn-around and technology development projects involved the development and execution of business and sales strategies, business models and processes, market and channel strategies, operating structures and executive team recruitment, development and support. Brett graduated with a Bachelor of Science from the University of Auckland, with a major in Geology.

Gary Rieschel
Qiming Venture Partners

Gary Rieschel has over 25 years of operating and investing experience in the information technology industry. Most recently, Gary was the founder of SOFTBANK Venture Capital/Mobius Venture Capital in the U.S. (1996), a firm with nearly $2 billion USD under management. In this role, Gary invested in over 50 technology companies leading to successful IPO exits at UTStarcom, Concentric Networks, Verisign, USWeb, Net2Phone, Puma Technology (through acquisitions), Digimarc, Intertrust, and Critical Path, and successful M&A transactions for GeoCities (Yahoo!), Art.com (Getty Images), and Datapower (IBM).

Gary has led investments in Chinese companies TopSec, Accelergy, Bokee (Blog China), and Yeelion. Gary has also sponsored the creation of several other top venture firms, including Ignition Partners (partners in Qiming), Grandbanks Capital, and Arrowpath in the U.S., and SOFTBANK Asia Infrastructure Fund I/II (SAIF Partners) in China. Prior to his 10 years as a venture capitalist, Gary held senior executive positions at nCUBE (Sr. VP), Cisco Systems (Director, Worldwide Channels/Programs), Sequent Computer Systems (General Manager Asia Pacific), and Intel Corporation (Quality Assurance Manager).

Gary holds a B.A. from Reed College where he serves on the board of trustees, and an MBA from Harvard Business School. Gary is also known for his love of wine and sports of all kinds. He and his family moved to Shanghai in January, 2005.

Dr. Alex Westlake
ClearWorld Now

Dr. Alex Westlake is a Director and one of the founders of ClearWorld Now. Alex is based permanently in Beijing where he has worked since 1998. Alex has ten years’ experience in renewable energy technology development and the utility sector, both in the UK and Asia, with firms PowerGen (now E.On) and IT Power. Alex is considered to be a leading expert in clean energy and the Clean Development Mechanism in China, and was integral to the development of China’s first CDM project – the Huitengxile Wind farm. Alex was a core member of the team that took Camco public in 2006.

Don Ye
Tsing Capital

Mr. Don Ye is the Managing Partner of Tsing Capital, the first cleantech capital management firm in China with a serial of China Environment Funds (www.cefund.com) under management.

Don Ye founded the firm in 2001, as well as China Environment Fund 2002 and China Environment Fund 2004, which have become the first and most prominent cleantech funds in China.

In China, Mr. Ye was selected as 2002 “the Most Active Venture Capitalist”, 2003 “Top Ten Best Venture Capitalists” in China, 2003 “China New Economy People 100”, 2004 “China Environment People” nominee, as well as the 2005 Cleantech “Pioneer Award”.

He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics from the University of International Business and Economics (UIBE) in Beijing, China.

Charles Yen
Deloitte China Clients & Markets

Charles Yen is the National Managing Partner of Deloitte China Clients & Markets, responsible for the development and implementation of clients & markets strategy of the China firm. Additionally, Charles is the national leader of the firm's Venture Capital (VC) Alliance Program.

Prior to joining Deloitte China in 2004, Charles was a management consultant in Chicago, U.S.A. before he became an Partner of Deloitte & Touche Taiwan and the Managing Director of Deloitte Consulting Taiwan.

Charles has profound expertise in organization restructuring, merger & acquisition, IPO, finance & performance management. He provides professional services to a wide range of industries including high-tech, media, telecom, consumer business and automobile. Charles has extensive experiences in serving both multinational and local clients.

Charles is a Certified Public Accountant of U.S.A. and Taiwan. He is also the former president of Asia American Multi-Technology Association in Beijing.