Interviews
The interviews in the Creating Emerging Markets archive form a permanent and unique resource held in Harvard Business School’s Baker Library. Many interview transcripts can be downloaded immediately in full, and all others are available upon request. Each interview page includes supporting resources about the interviewee and her or his business. If the interview is conducted in a local language, an English translation is provided. Many of the interviews are on video. These full-length video interviews are available to qualified researchers by contacting HBS archivist Rachel Wise. Harvard ID holders are able to access the full-length videos through the website.
We welcome feedback and suggestions for ways to improve the project.
- Oman
Mohammed Al Barwani
Founder and Chairman, MB Holding Company
(Oil; Gas; Mining Exploration; Diversified)
“If you can invest in brands internationally, and especially brands which are exclusive, there’s always a market and there’s always demand.”
- Ghana
Kwasi Abeasi
CEO, Africa Investconsult Ltd.
(Financial Services)
“You have to negotiate. And you have to go with a team that knows how to negotiate. Otherwise you’ll get a deal that looks good. Later on you find out it’s no good.”
- Bangladesh
Sir Fazle Hasan Abed
Founder and Chair, BRAC
(Microfinance, Development)
“I’ve never thought that you can do good only through nonprofit activities. You can do good also by doing business.”
- Argentina
Arturo Acevedo
President, Grupo Arcelor Mittal (Acindar)
(Steel and Mining)
“It is important to clearly define social responsibility. We have always upheld a very active and responsible policy in this field. We make mistakes, and a lot of things still need improving, but corporate social responsibility is a major corporate concept.”
- India
Anu Aga
Thermax Private, Ltd.
(Equipment Manufacturing)
“[As a leader], you don’t have to know everything In fact, one of the beliefs I have is [that] skills can be hired. The leader has to show wisdom—that cannot be hired.”
- Sri Lanka
Abbas Akbarally
Chairman, Akbar Brothers
(Tea; Diversified)
“The main thing is integrity, honesty; and once the banks know that you are not going to take their money and go to the casino, they will give you the money.”
- Turkey
Hamdi Akın
Founder and Chairman, Akfen Holding
(Construction, infrastructure)
“[W]e want these companies to last 100, 200, or even 300 years. We want them to survive in the long term. We don’t want them to just live and die with us.”
- Saudi Arabia
Muhammad Alagil
Jarir Marketing
(Electronics; office supplies; books; diversified)
“We just want to keep developing a good reputation. We want to have exciting time. We want to add something to the community.”
- Kuwait
Kutayba Alghanim
Chairman, Alghanim Industries
(Diversified)
“Being able to be flexible is good, because conditions in the marketplace change—continuously. You have to keep up with those conditions.”
- Chile
Roberto de Andraca
Chair, Cap S.A.
(Steel)
“[I]n 1998–2000, when a severe steel price depression developed and 30% of steel companies went bankrupt. At the time we already ranked among the 20% lowest-cost steel companies.”
- Chile
Roberto Angelini Rossi
Chair, Empresas Copec S.A. and AntarChile S.A.
(Petroleum, Forestry, and Fishing)
“Businessmen are never allowed to say ‘I’m done.’ We can never sit down to see what happens. There is constant evolution ... we must provide orientation to our companies and keep on expanding and innovating.”
- Peru
Eva Arias
President, Compañía Minera Poderosa
(Mining)
“The economics of a mine—any mine—creates a very deep symbiosis with the local area For instance, at Poderosa, we provide employment—counting our own employees and outsourced workers who do some specific jobs—to over 3,500 people.”
- Philippines
Jaime Augusto Zobel de Ayala
Ayala Corporation
(Real Estate, Infrastructure, Insurance, Banking)
“We wanted to be part and parcel of the development cycle of the country and to be relevant as an institution in a country which needed a lot of growth, a lot of development, and a lot of institutional support. [We wanted] to have an Ayala that was relevant to the national development agenda, but at the same time put capital to work and gave good return on investment.”
- Turkey
Gülsüm Azeri
Group President, Şişecam; CEO, OMV Petrol Ofisi
(Chemicals and glass; Petroleum)
“[B]eing an engineer always helped me. I went for R&D. If there wasn’t sufficient R&D, I formed it...”
- Pakistan
Seema Aziz
Founder, CARE Foundation; Managing Director, Sefam
(Education and Retail)
“I understood that an education [is] the only gift which no flood can take away, which becomes a part of a person and changes lives like nothing else can.”
- India
Shabana Azmi
Actress
(Cinema)
“Art can lead to a climate in which sensitivity allows change to occur, and with it inherently comes social responsibility.”
- Pakistan
Syed Babar Ali
Founder, Lahore University of Management Sciences
(Education; Government)
“I felt, having been in industry and business for a fair amount of time, that you could so much with management, but not enough unless you added value to what the country is producing.”
- Mexico
Alberto Baillères
CEO, Grupo Bal
(Diversified)
“One of the cornerstones of the group’s competitiveness, in comparison to our international competition, is our emphasis on human relations. We try very hard to be a family”
- India
Rahul Bajaj
Chair, Bajaj Group
(Diversified)
“We were in a socialist raj. You couldn’t make anything until you got an industrial license and you couldn’t make more than the license capacity.”
- Argentina
Susana Balbo
Owner and Chief Winemaker, Susana Balbo Wines
(Wine)
“I had to find a way to produce modern wines with little resources. It’s amazing how resourceful we can be when we need to: we are not aware of the tools we have until we start using them.”
