AIT chooses its new president

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AIT chooses its new president

By The Nation

 

Dr Eden Y Woon/Photo from AIT

 

Dr Eden Y Woon, a Chinese-American, has been named the new president of the Asian Institute of Technology (AIT) as of September 1.

 

“I will seek to bring positive energy to AIT and will ensure that AIT is a caring organisation to its stakeholders – students, faculty, staff, alumni and friends,” Woon said.

 

A panel chaired by BTS Group Holdings’ executive director Dr Anat Arbhabhirama chose Woon as successor to the eighth AIT president, Professor Worsak Kanok-Nukulchai.

 

Woon has wide-ranging experience in the military, private sector and academia. Receiving his Bachelor’s in Arts (Phi Beta Kappa) from the University of Iowa, he obtained his Master’s in Arts, Masters in Science and PhD degrees (all in mathematics) from the University of Washington in Seattle.

 

He was most recently the vice-chairman of Alba Group Asia. Berlin-based Alba Group is one of the world’s leading environmental engineering and services companies. 

 

From 2010 until November 2017, Woon was vice-president for Institutional Advancement at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, and for four years before that, Woon was based in Shanghai as managing director of Li & Fung Group’s China corporate office and managing director of Toys “R” Us China. Woon has also been vice-president of Starbucks Coffee Company in China, and has held the post of CEO at the Hong Kong General Chamber of Commerce too. 

 

While in the United States, he was executive director of the Seattle-based Washington State China Relations Council. 

 

Woon also served in the US Air Force until 1993, retiring as a colonel, and also acted as China policy adviser to the US Secretary of Defence. Before that, Woon taught mathematics at the US Air Force Academy for six and a half years, becoming an associate professor. His initial assignment in the US Air Force was as a computer analyst in the Air Force Systems Command.

 

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/detail/national/30353990

 

 

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