News

Dr. Denis Fred Simon, Provost and Chief Academic Officer of the Levin Graduate Institute, awarded China's 2006 Friendship Award

For Immediate Release:

New York, N.Y. September 30, 2006 Dr. Denis Fred Simon, Provost and Chief Academic Officer of the Levin Graduate Institute under the State University of New York, is among 49 foreigners winning the 2006 Friendship Award of China. He and other awardees were invited to the celebration of the 57th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China. This included a meeting with Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and a state banquet hosted by Premier Wen on the eve of the National Day, which is October 1.

This annual award, set up in 1991, is the highest honor the Chinese government confers on foreign experts working in and for China. This year, the government received some 7,000 nominations, and the awardees are from 19 countries. In 2005, over 450,000 foreign experts came to China to work on both long-term and short-term assignments. Chinese Vice Premier Hui Liangyu presided over the awards ceremony in Beijing, which was held in the Great Hall of the People in Tiananmen Square. Also in attendance was Vice-Minister of Science and Technology, Shang Yong, who recently worked with Dr. Simon to organize a major international conference in New York City on industrial innovation in China.

Vice Premier Hui extended warm personal congratulations to Dr. Simon and his fellow winners of the Friendship Award. He expressed appreciation for their outstanding contributions to China's development by bringing advanced technologies, management expertise, and experience that China needs in its modernization drive. During the past year, Dr. Simon has won awards given at China's municipal, provincial, and national levels, testifying to his unique and substantial contributions to the economic, social and technological development of China.

The Levin Institute, under Dr. Simon's academic leadership, has organized and conducted customized executive training programs designed to enhance the innovative capacity and management skills of managers at China's software enterprises, high-tech companies, and research organizations. In 2005, Dr. Simon was appointed as the first foreign science and technology advisor to the city of Dalian, located in Liaoning Province in Northeast China. In that capacity, Dr. Simon advises the Dalian government, the Dalian Science & Technology Bureau, and other elements of the Dalian municipal government on how to make Dalian an incubation hub for turning new science and technology based start-up businesses into commercially viable enterprises. Of central importance is a special initiative to help Dalian move more aggressively into the world of IT outsourcing.

Dr. Simon is a recognized expert on contemporary Chinese affairs, having first visited China in 1981. Along with a distinguished academic career that has included serving on the full-time faculties at MIT, The Fletcher School at Tufts University and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, he also has worked in the world of strategic management consulting, serving as General Manager for Andersen Consulting in China (1998-2000) (now called Accenture) and as President of The Monitor Group China in Beijing (2001-2002). Dr. Simon has written extensively on the problems of technological innovation in China and is in the process of completing a book manuscript (with Dr. Cong Cao) titled "The Emerging Chinese Technological Edge: The Role of High-End Scientific and Technical Talent."

The Neil D. Levin Institute of International Relations is a new graduate level institution situated in New York City under the State University of New York. Its core mission is to train traditional graduate students and working professionals to live and work effectively and ethically in the globalized world of the 21st century. As an academic start-up, the Levin Institute has developed an innovative, modular-type, team-oriented, project based pedagogy that emphasizes the teaching of skills needed to be effective at managing across borders and cultures.