Samuel Tsien: OCBC Group CEO

Samuel Tsien earned a Bachelor of Arts degree with Honours in Economics from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). He has 36 years of solid banking experience. From 1995 to 2006, he was President and Chief Executive Officer of Bank of America (Asia), and Asia Consumer and Commercial Banking Group Executive of Bank of America Corporation. 

Before joining OCBC Bank, Samuel was the President and Chief Executive Officer of China Construction Bank (Asia) when China Construction Bank acquired Bank of America (Asia). He joined OCBC Bank in July 2007 as Senior Executive Vice President, in charge of the Group’s corporate and commercial banking business. He assumed in 2008, the role as Global Head of Global Corporate Bank with added responsibilities of overseeing the financial institution and transaction banking businesses. 

Samuel who is in his late 50s was appointed Group Chief Executive Officer on April 15, 2012. 

Overseas-Chinese Banking Corp. Ltd is one of the largest public companies in the world with annual sales of over $8 billion with 29,512 employees.  It engages in banking, life assurance, general insurance, asset management, investment holding, future, and stockbroking businesses. The bank’s headquarters is in Singapore. 

R. Milton Johnson: HCA Chairman & Chief Executive Officer

R. Milton Johnson is a native of Nashville, Tennessee. He holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Belmont University. He worked as an accountant with what is now Ernst & Young and spent a couple of years working with HCA accountants. So when he joined HCA in 1982 he had been walking the halls of their headquarters since 1980. So he had actually been involved with HCA right after graduating from college. 

During the period HCA had a large international presence, Milton worked with executives responsible for managing hospitals in the Philippines, Singapore, Australia, and Saudi Arabia. He developed relationships with many of those men and women over time. R. Milton even helped them with their personal tax returns. When HCA offered him a position in the tax department, it wasn’t as if he was joining an unfamiliar company in fact is was quite the opposite. 

In 1987 he was head of HealthTrust tax department when HCA spun off the company. He came back to HCA as vice president of tax when HealthTrust was taken back in by HCA. 

R. Milton climbed the corporate ladder becoming senior vice president and controller, then executive vice president and chief financial offer. In 2009, he was appointed to the board of directors of HCA.  In 2011, he was named president of HCA. In January 2014 ,he began serving as the company’s CEO and on December 2014, he also became chairman. 

R. Milton leads a huge organization, a close to $36 billion integrated healthcare system that includes around 166 hospitals, 113 freestanding surgery centers, and more than 35,000 affiliated physicians  in 20 states and the United Kingdom. The company has its in payroll 220,000 employees of which around 35 percent are registered nurses. 

Milton is a committed volunteer and has held offices in a number of organizations within the community. He is currently a co-chair of Partnership 2020 with the Nashville Chamber of Commerce and serves on the boards of Nashville Health Care Council and the United Way of Metro Nashville, among others. 

Chang-Soo Kim: Samsung Life Insurance Co CEO & President

There are many huge corporations run by competent managers who are not that well know internationally. Chang-Soo Kim runs one of the largest companies on the planet and must therefore have what it takes to handle such a large responsibility. 

Chang-Soo Kim is a business administration graduate of Korea University. Among the various managerial positions he has held include serving as Vice President and Head of Plant and Machinery Division of Samsung C&T Corporation. He was also the Chief Executive Officer and President of Samsung Fire & Marine Insurance Co., Ltd. 

In January 28, 2014, Kim became Chief Executive Officer and President of Samsung Life Insurance Co., Ltd. He also serves as an Executive Director at Samsung Life Insurance Co., Ltd. 

Samsung Life Insurance Co., Ltd. was founded on April 24, 1957, and is based in Seoul, South Korea. It engages in the life insurance and financial services business. The firm runs its businesses through the following divisions: insurance, loan, corporate pension, fund and trust. It conducts its business within the domestic market and to overseas markets.

It is one of the largest publicly listed companies in the world with 5,353 employees and sales of $24 billion. 

Lamberto Andreotti: Bristol-Myers Squibb Chairman

Lamberto Andreotti was born on July 6, 1950, in Rome, Italy. He earned an engineering degree from Sapienza University of Rome. Lamberto would later earn a Master of Science degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 

He worked for a number of pharmaceutical companies such as Farmitalia Carlo Erba, KABI Pharmacia and Pharmacia & Upjohn. Lamberto then joined Bristol-Myers Squibb in 1998 as Vice President and General Manager, European Oncology and Italy. He rose further up the executive ladder holding roles of increasing responsibility. Lamberto was elected to the Board of Directors in 2009. In 2010 he was named Chief Executive Officer, he served in this role for five years. 

Under his stewardship, the company transformed becoming a leader in the biopharma industry. The company is now known for its robust pipeline and portfolio of innovative medicines, it has also pioneered the increasingly promising field of immuno-oncology.  Earlier in the year he announced his retirement as CEO to coincide right after his 65th birthday to devote more time to his personal life. 

Since Lamberto assumed the CEO role, based in early January 2015, company shares have gained around 196 percent compared to 90 percent for the S&P 500. Lamberto is now the Chairman of Bristol-Myers Squibb, the pharma company that generates annual revenue of around $16 billion. 

Bristol-Myers was founded in 1887 by William McLaren Bristol and John Ripley Myers in Clinton, New York. Squibb on the other hand was founded in 1858 by Edward Robinson Squibb in Brooklyn, New York.  The Squibb corporation served as a major supplier of medical goods to the Union Army during the United States Civil War, providing portable medical kits containing morphine, surgical anesthetics, and quinine for the treatment of malaria (which was endemic in most of the eastern United States at that time). 

Bristol-Myers Squibb was formed in 1989, following the merger of its predecessors Bristol-Myers and the Squibb Corporation. 

Chung Mong-Koo: Hyundai Moto Co. Chairman

Chung Mong-Koo was born on March 19, 1938, in Tongchong County, Gangwon Province, South Korea. Chung is the second son of the late Chung Ju-Yung, the son of a peasant farmer, who after the Korean War, repaired trucks for the US Army and went on to create a conglomerate that help set South Korea on a direction to becoming an export powerhouse and the fourth-largest economy in Asia. 

Chung graduated from Kyungbock High Schools and holds a Bachelor of Science degree in industrial engineering  from Hanyang University. 

Chung succeeded his father as chairman of the Hyundai Motor group which is made up of 42 subsidiaries and is the second largest Chaebol in South Korea. He was convicted of embezzlement and breach of fiduciary duty on February 2007, but was given a suspended sentence and was fully pardoned by President Lee Myung-bak. To make amends, Chung agreed to donate $1 billion over several years to benefit Korean society. 

Even though already in his mid 70s he is very much active in the group’s management and is said to personally head monthly quality reviews with senior executives. 

Benoît Potier: Air Liquide Chairman & CEO

Frenchman Benoît Potier was born in 1957 and is a graduate of the prestigious École Centrale de Paris. In 1981 he joined Air Liquide as a Research  and Development engineer.  He became a Project Manager in the Engineering and Construction Division. Benoît was later named Vice-President of Energy and Development in the Large Industries business line. 

He continued his climb up the corporate ladder and was made Director of Strategy & Organization in 1993. The following year we became head  of the Chemicals, Metal & Steel,  Oil and Energy Markets.  In 1995 Air Liquide appointed him an Executive Vice-President with additional responsibilities over the Engineering & Construction Division and the Large Industries operations in Europe. 

In 1997 Benoît was named Senior Executive Vice-President  and was appointed to the Board of Directors in 2000. In November 2001 he became Chairman of the Management Board. 

Benoît reached the position the only a select few will every achieve, he was named Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of L’Air Liquide SA in 2006. 

With more than 50,000 employees and over $20 billion in sales, Air Liquide SA is on of the largest publicly listed companies in the world. The company Benoît heads is headquartered in Paris, France and was founded on November 8, 1902, by George Claude and Paul Delorme. 

It supplies gases, technologies and services for the industry and health businesses. Air Liquide SA operates its business through three segments: Gas & Services, Engineering & Construction and Other Activities. 

The Gas & Services segment engages in the supply of gases, which is organized by geographical areas such as Europe, America, Asia-Pacific and the Middle-East and Africa. The Engineering & Construction segment designs, develops and builds industrial gas production plants for the Group and third parties. It also designs and manufactures plants in the traditional, renewable and alternative energy sectors. The Other Activities segment primarily operates its business through two businesses: Welding and Diving. 

George Cope: BCE and Bell Canada President & CEO

George Cope was raised in Port Perry, a small town in Ontario, Canada. He played basketball for Western University until a knee injury sidelined him. George earned a Business Administration (Honours) degree from Ivey Business School at Western University and was conferred an honorary Doctor of Laws from Western in recognition of his success in telecommunications and his dedication to promoting mental health awareness. 

George was President and CEO of  cellphone provider Clearnet for 13 years. The company was bought out by TELUS Mobility in 2000 and George eventually wound up as President and CEO of TELUS Mobility. 

He became president and CEO of BCE and Bell Canada in 2008. 

BCE Inc., is a telecommunications and media company that provides wireless, wireline, Internet and television services to residential, business, and wholesale customers in Canada. The company operates through Bell Wireless, Bell Wireline, and Bell Media segments. 

The company operates approximately 30 conventional TV stations; and 39 speciality pay, pay, and pay-per-view TV channels; 106 radio stations; 10,500 advertising faces; and 200 Websites. 

Wolfgang Büchele: Linde AG CEO

Wolfgang Büchele was born in 1959 in Geislingen, Germany. He holds a degree in chemistry graduating from the University of Ulm, Germany in 1984. Wolfgang completed his doctorate in natural sciences  with special field in inorganic chemistry in 1987.

From 1984 until 1987 he was an assistant in the Department of Inorganic Chemistry at the University of Ulm,Germany. 

Wolfgang began his career as a research chemist at BASF AG, Ludwigshafen in 1987. From 1990 onwards, he held various executive positions in Ludwigshafen, Germany and Hong Kong, China. In 2001 he was named President for Eastern Europe, Africa, West Asia Regional Division. Wolfgang became President of the Performance Chemicals Division in 2003. In 2005 he was appointed President of the Fine Chemicals Division. 

Wolfgang became a Project Advisor  at The Blackstone Group International Partners LLP, London, UK in 2008. Then from 2009 until 2011 he was member of the Board and CEO of BordsodChem Zrt., in Budapest, Hungary. From 2012 until 2014 he was the President and CEO of Kemira Oyj, Helsinki, Finland. 

With his and solid leadership experience in the chemicals industry it wasn’t a surprise when he was named CEO of Munich, Germany based Linde AG.

The Linde Group, registered as Linde AG was founded in 1879 by Carl von Linde in Germany. It is now a multinational industrial gases and engineering company. Linde AG is the world’s largest industrial gas company by market share and by revenue as well. The company’s shares are traded in all the German stock exchanges and in Zurich as well. The Linde share price is also included in the DAX 30 index. Aside from its Munich headquarters there is also some supporting headquarter functions in Surrey, England. 

The Linde Group has more than 600 affiliated companies in over 100 countries, with customers in the industrial, retail, trade, science, research, and public sectors. It registered revenue of €17.047 billion in 2014 on assets of €34.425 billion. 

Marc N. Casper: Thermo Fisher Scientific President & CEO

Marc N. Casper earned a bachelor’s degree in economics from Wesleyan University. Marc obtained an MBA with high distinction from Harvard Business School. He began his career as a strategist at Bain & Company and later moved to Bain Capital. 

Marc was President-Americas for clinical diagnostics provider Dade Behring, Inc. He later became President, Chief Executive Officer and director of Kendro Laboratory Products. He then joined Thermo Fisher Scientific in 2001 as President of the Life Sciences sector of Thermo Electron. 

In 2003, he was named Senior Vice President, and in 2005 was given responsibility for all of the company’s operating divisions. After the merging creating Thermo Fisher Scientific in 2006, he was named President of Analytic Technologies. Marc was named Chief Operating Officer in 2008.  In October 2009, March became President and Chief Executive Officer of Thermo Fisher Scientific. 

Thermo Fisher Scientific, Inc. (NYSE:TMO) is the world leader in servicing science, with revenues of $17 billion and approximately 50,000 employees in 50 countries. The company helps customers accelerate life sciences research, solve complex analytical challenges, improve patient diagnostics and increase laboratory productivity.