Manila, Philippines – A group of graduate students from the Singapore Management University (SMU) met with Primer Group of Companies’ Board of Directors and other company leaders in a forum conducted at the sidelines of the PIML conference last August 24.
During the forum, Primer Group President and CEO Jimmy Thai, PIML Managing Director Mark Chim, Primer Europe LTD Country Head David Goulding, and AVP for BDCC Roel Chan discussed with the students the business system of the company.
Aside from the forum, the students were also given a tour around the conference and exhibit area, to give them an idea on how Primer Group’s global offices plan their purchase for the upcoming season.
Also present during the forum were BOD advisers Gary Yeang and Jeff Lim.
MBA students from Singapore Management University visit Primer Group
In an interview after the event, SMU Postgraduate Professional Programmes Dean Dr. Philip Zerrillo thanked the speakers for a “fulfilling talk.”
“This is a great visit for us because it’s an opportunity for the students to see how the value chain really comes together and the key players in it,” he said. “It was a great presentation, and the students got to ask questions that they wanted to ask and that everybody was kind in the way they answered them.”
“I think the overall opportunity to hear from different people from different regions, also to see some of the stock and how it’s laid out for the principals when they come together is just an exciting time for the students,” he added.
This was the second batch of students which Zerillo brought to Primer Group for a business study mission. About 21 SMU students visited the Primer headquarters in Manila last year.
“What we do with the business study mission is, we take them to a country and what we try to do is see a different group of businesses, so that they’d understand what it’s like to do business in a different country such as the Philippines,” he explained.
One of the MBA students, Jeanine Ho, meanwhile shared her fascination with the business system of the company.
“You are able to operate just very strongly and that Philippines exports that same thing outside the Philippines,” she said. “And I think distributorship regional has a lot of potential.”