Board of Advisors
Professor John Park
Director, Korea Working Group
Lecturer, Harvard Kennedy School
Faculty Affiliate, Project on Managing the Atom at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs
+ Biography
Professor John Park is Director of the Korea Project and an Adjunct Lecturer at the Harvard Kennedy School. He is also a Faculty Affiliate with the Project on Managing the Atom at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. Professor Park was the 2012-13 Stanton Nuclear Security Junior Faculty Fellow at MIT’s Security Studies Program. He previously directed Northeast Asia Track 1.5 projects at the U.S. Institute of Peace in Washington, D.C. These initiatives include the U.S.-China Project on Crisis Avoidance & Cooperation, the U.S.-ROK-Japan Trilateral Dialogue in Northeast Asia, and the U.S.-China-Japan Dialogue on Risk Reduction & Crisis Prevention. He advises Northeast Asia policy-focused officials in the U.S. government.
Professor Park previously worked at Goldman Sachs, where he specialized in U.S. military privatization financing projects. Prior to that, he was the project leader of the North Korea Analysis Group at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center. He earlier worked in Goldman Sachs’ M&A Advisory Group in Hong Kong and The Boston Consulting Group’s Financial Services Practice in Seoul.
Professor Park’s current research focuses on the North Korean regime’s accumulated learning in evading targeted sanctions. Professor Park received his M.Phil. and Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge. He completed his pre-doctoral and post-doctoral training at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center.
While at Cambridge, Professor Park was a delegate to HPAIR’s 1996 conference in Seoul. He later served as a workshop leader for HPAIR’s 1999 conference in Hong Kong.
Professor Karen Thornber
Professor of Comparative Literature and of East Asian Languages and Civilizations,
Harvard University Faculty of Arts and Sciences
Victor and William Fung Director,
Harvard University Asia Center
Chair, Harvard University Asia Center Council
+ Biography
Professor Karen Thornber is a Professor of East Asian Languages and Civilizations and of Comparative Literature at Harvard University, where she is also Victor and William Fung Director of the Harvard University Asia Center and Chair of the Harvard Asia Center Council. Dr. Thornber is author of three major scholarly monographs – Empire of Texts in Motion: Chinese, Korean, and Taiwanese Transculturations of Japanese Literature (Harvard 2009); Ecoambiguity: Environmental Crises and East Asian Literatures (Michigan 2012); and Global Healing: Literature, Advocacy, Care (Brill forthcoming 2019). Empire of Texts in Motion and Ecoambiguity both were the recipients of multiple international awards, the former from the ICLA and AAS and the latter from ACLA, ASLE, and ICLA. Professor Thornber is also an award-winning translator of Japanese poetry of the atomic bomb. Co-editor of a special issue of Literature and Medicine on World Literature and Health, a special issue of Humanities on Global Indigeneities and Environment which was also published as a separate volume, and a volume on The Poetics of Aging in the Japanese Narrative Arts, Professor Thornber has also published more than 70 articles on comparative and world literature, East Asian literatures and cultures, the literatures and cultures of the Indian Ocean Rim, diaspora, gender, indigeneities, postcolonialism, transculturation, trauma, and the environmental humanities and medical and health humanities. Current projects include a scholarly monograph on Gender, Leadership, and Asia; a textbook on Asian Feminisms; a co-edited special issue of the journal World Literature on trans-Asian literatures and cultures; and articles on Asian American literatures.
Professor Mark Wu
Henry L. Stimson Professor of Law,
Harvard Law School
Faculty Director of the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society
Member of the Faculty Advisory Committees of the East Asian Legal Studies Program and the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies
Faculty Associate, Harvard University Center for the Environment
+ Biography
Professor Mark Wu is the Henry L. Stimson Professor at Harvard Law School. His research focuses on international trade law, including issues concerning emerging economies, digital trade, intellectual property, trade remedies, environment, and investment.
At Harvard, Professor Wu is a Faculty Director of the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society. He serves as a member of the Faculty Advisory Committees of the East Asian Legal Studies Program and the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies. He is also a Faculty Associate of Harvard University’s Center for the Environment.
In 2016, Professor Wu was appointed by the World Trade Organization to serve on the Advisory Board for the WTO Chairs Programme. He also serves on the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Trade and Foreign Direct Investment. In addition, he works with the World Bank on assessing trade agreements and serves on multiple expert groups convened by the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development. He is an Editorial Board member of the World Trade Review and of the World Intellectual Property Organization’s series on intellectual property, innovation and economic development.
Prior to academia, Professor Wu served as the Director for Intellectual Property in the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative. He was the lead U.S. negotiator for the IP chapters of several free trade agreements. He continues to serve as a principal liaison to the Trade and Environment Policy Advisory Committee.
Before government service, Professor Wu worked as a management consultant at McKinsey & Company where he led engagements in technology sectors. He began his career as an economist and operations officer with the World Bank in China, working on environmental, urban development, health and rural poverty issues. He also worked briefly as an economist for the United Nations Development Programme in Namibia.
Professor Wu received his J.D. from Yale Law School, his M.Sc. in Development Economics from Oxford University (where he studied as a Rhodes Scholar), and his A.B. summa cum laude in Social Studies and East Asian Studies from Harvard University. As an undergrad at Harvard, Wu was part of the inaugural HPAIR organizing committees.
David Lee
Partner, SK Telecom Ventures
Partner, B&C Group
Chief Corporate Development Officer, 451 Media
Co-Founder, XG Ventures
Co-Founder, Kstartup
Former Director of Asia-Pacific, Google
+ Biography
David was hired at Google in 2000 as one of the first 200 employees, and was the first executive to lead their overseas business development, sales, and operations. He went on to launch Google’s first international ads and founded their offices in Asia, Europe and Latin America. He hired the first international management teams, and established Google’s initial overseas business.
Following Google, David co-founded XG Ventures, a Google alumni fund and was co-founding Partner of SK Telecom Ventures, the largest Korean mobile carrier’s $100M corporate venture fund based in Silicon Valley, while launching KStartup, the first startup accelerator in Asia to be funded by Google. His personal and VC investments include over 50 companies with 20+ acquisitions. Past and present portfolio includes Tapulous (acq. by Disney), Posterous (acq. by Twitter), Olaworks (acq. by Intel), Scoopler (acq. by Google), ABitLucky (acq. by Zynga), Chai Labs (acq. by Facebook), Cue (acq. by Apple), Kabam (acq. by Netmarble), Chartboost, nWay, Wish, Omlet, and many others. David is also an LP in Y Combinator and SV Angel.
In 2015, he partnered with Dir. Michael Bay (Transformers, The Rock) at 451 Media, to lead their technology and media investments and partnerships. David later formed Open Source Studios, a Stanford Business School based advisory group with Professor and two time Oscar winning Dir. Bill Guttentag, to help exceptional founders of tech and media startups such as MasterClass and Illumix. David is also a Partner at B&C GROUP, a leading talent management and production company, helping to connect Korea, Hollywood and Silicon Valley leaders in tech and entertainment. David continues to work closely with emerging tech, media, and content companies as an investor, advisor, board member or executive.
Hari Nair
r&D vice president, proctor and gamble
visiting scholar & advanced leadership fellow, harvard
founder, second chance for health
former group chief strategy and innovation officer, sime darby
+ Biography
Hari’s currently a R&D Vice President at Procter and Gamble. He is also a Visiting Scholar and Advanced Leadership Fellow at Harvard. Hari’s fellowship research focused on education and health which led to the establishment of three initiatives: Aeternum is focused on an innovative education platform for those above 50 years old facing career and personal transitions; Second Chance for Health is focused on creating kitchens in workplaces to give employees paid to to cook healthy meals; Sureksha Labs a diagnostic service for biomonitoring in rural India.
Prior to Harvard, Hari was the Group Chief Strategy & Innovation Officer for Sime Darby, a $13 Billion USD conglomerate and diversified multinational, with businesses in key growth sectors namely, plantations, industrial equipment, motors, property and energy & utilities with operations in more than 20 countries. Hari led the Group’s Strategy, Innovation, M&A, and Corporate Finance teams and created Sime Darby’s long term value creation agenda. The strategy and transformation culminated in the creation of 3 standalone pure play listed companies on the Kuala Lumpur stock exchange in late 2017 (the largest demerger in Malaysian corporate history) and created a $6 Billion USD increase enterprise value which has been sustained. Prior to joining Sime Darby, Hari served as the Global Managing Director for Kimberly Clark’s Global Innovation Center (GIC) based in Seoul, South Korea. In this role, Hari had all site-wide responsibilities for the GIC, including the leadership of several global programs.
From 2006-2012, Hari was Partner and VP at Innosight, a firm founded by Clayton Christensen, the leading authority on disruptive innovation, collaborating with companies to devise growth strategies, building innovation capabilities, and creating products and services that improve people’s lives. Hari began his career with Procter & Gamble, where he spent 14 years, serving various senior leadership roles in US and China.
Hari also serves as a faculty member for strategy & innovation for Duke Corporate Education, Carlson School of Management and Tuck School of Business Executive Education programs.
Lesly Goh
senior technology advisor, world bank group
fellow, Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance, cambridge Judge Business School
Senior Fellow, Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore
Professor of Practice, Zhejiang International Business School
+ Biography
Lesly Goh transitioned to World Bank Senior Technology Advisor after serving as the Chief Technology Officer role. She is a Fellow at Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance (CCAF) Judge Business School and Senior Fellow at National University of Singapore (NUS) Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy. Lesly is appointed as Professor of Practice by ZheJiang International Business School (ZIBS). Her expertise is in leveraging emerging technology to deliver agile solutions for Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) at the intersection of technology and policy frameworks. For almost 30 years, her experience on FinTech, RegTech, GovTech spans across both the private and public sectors. She has worked extensively on the practical application of Disruptive Technology such as Blockchain, AI, IoT, 5G and Edge Computing. She was featured in the GovInsider Report 2019: Women Leaders in Government.
Lesly’s experience in the private sector covers a broad spectrum ranging from Capital Markets, Retail Banking, Commercial Banking, Asset Management, Development Banks and Financial Data Providers. Her personal mission is to empower Women and Girls to achieve the highest potential with Technology as the Equalizer. Here is her TEDx Talk and her story: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/leaving-microsoft-empower-women-change-world-lesly-goh/
Lesly is a mentor/advisor for several FinTech startups in Asia and a Fellow at Singapore University of Social Sciences. Lesly has been an advocate for Women in Technologies and academia for students in STEM such as DigiGirlz from her background in Computer Engineering and Mathematics. She is also a key contributor for Cloud Platform in the working group with IFC and Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) for the ASEAN Financial Innovation Network (AFIN initiative). Lesly is a strong supporter of Singapore Smart Nation and serves as Board Member of Singapore GovTech.
Lesly is a certified Data Architect and worked on many high-profile Data and AI initiatives in highly regulated industries such as Financial Services, Healthcare/Life Sciences and Smart Cities. For almost 30 years, she specialized in Advanced Analytics such as BI/Analytics, Data Mining, Data Visualization, Machine Learning, Pattern Matching, Forecasting model, and Semantic Analysis. She brings a balance of technology specialty and business strategy from the Management Consulting background at Deloitte.
Martin Roll
BUSINESS & BRAND STRATEGIST, MARTIN ROLL COMPANY
FORMER SENIOR ADVISOR, MCKINSEY & COMPANY
DISTINGUISHED FELLOW, INSEAD BUSINESS SCHOOL
ENTREPRENEUR IN RESIDENCE, INSEAD BUSINESS SCHOOL
SENIOR ADVISOR, COCOON CAPITAL
FACULTY AND KEYNOTE SPEAKER, HPAIR
+ Biography
Martin Roll is an experienced global business strategist, senior advisor and facilitator to Fortune 500 companies, Asian conglomerates, family businesses and family offices. He advises clients on global strategy, transformation and leadership.
He is CEO of Martin Roll Company with more than 25 years of board & C-suite counselling experience. He is an advisor to several global boards and prominent business families, and a mentor for next generation leaders in business families, start-ups and high-growth companies.
Former senior advisor to McKinsey & Company.
Martin Roll is a highly accomplished keynote speaker at global conferences, an experienced conference moderator and executive workshop facilitator.
Martin Roll is a Distinguished Fellow (family business) and Entrepreneur in Residence at INSEAD Business School.
He teaches MBA, EMBA and Executive Education programs at INSEAD and Nanyang Business School, and is a frequent guest lecturer at ESSEC, IE Business School, Wharton Business School and other global business schools and universities.
Martin Roll is faculty and a regular keynote speaker at HPAIR, and faculty and keynote speaker at The Academies at Harvard.
Martin Roll is a Visiting Professor at China European International Business School (CEIBS).
He has been teaching luxury brand management and strategy at the LVMH Management Academy (Singapore Management University, SMU).
Martin Roll is a member of the global Advisory Council of Welspun Group (Mumbai), a Senior Advisor to early-stage venture fund Cocoon Capital (Singapore) and a Senior Advisor to Superson (Finland and Singapore).
He is the author of global bestseller “Asian Brand Strategy” (2015) and co-author of “The Future of Branding” (2016) with two new books in the pipeline on Family Business Strategy (2020) and Family Office Strategy (2021). Columnist for INSEAD Knowledge and regular commentator in global media.
Martin Roll has lived in Asia for two decades and serve clients on all continents. He holds an MBA from INSEAD.
Scott Xiao
Co-Founder and CEO, Luminopia
Former PRESIDENT of HPAIR (2017 - 2018)
+ Biography
Scott Xiao is a digital health entrepreneur who has co-founded two companies in the space — Luminopia and Odin. He is currently the CEO of Luminopia, a digital therapeutics company whose lead product is a groundbreaking new treatment for lazy eye. Working with leading clinicians at Boston Children’s Hospital and Johns Hopkins, his team has developed a virtual reality based device that modifies popular TV shows and movies into therapeutic visual stimuli, making treatment both more fun and effective.
For their work on Luminopia, Scott and his co-founder were named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 list for healthcare. They have also been recipients of several notable startup awards, as SXSW Impact Pediatric Health Winners, MassChallenge Silver Finalists, and Young Enterprise Initiative Winners. In 2017, a Harvard Business School case study was written about Luminopia, its founding story, and business.
Previously, Scott was a student at Harvard College and received the Detur Book Prize for outstanding academic standing, though his degree was ultimately sidetracked by his entrepreneurial pursuits. He has served as Co-Executive Director for the Harvard Project for Asian International Relations before, spearheading the 2018 Asia Conference in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. In his down time, Scott writes In Silico, a Substack newsletter about the future of tech and healthcare.
Zeel Patel
Former PRESIDENT of HPAIR (2020 - 2021)
FORMER Director of conference programming (2019 - 2020)
+ Biography
Zeel Patel is a senior at Harvard University studying Computer Science & Neuroscience, and served as the President of The Harvard Project for Asian International Relations (HPAIR) from 2020 - 2021 alongside Eric Lin.
Raised in India and hailing from Canada, Zeel was involved in orchestrating HPAIR’s Kazakhstan, Taiwan, and Dubai conferences in Asia — as well as the Harvard conferences in 2019 - 2021. Under his leadership, HPAIR and its team of 70 adapted rapidly to the COVID-19 pandemic and grew to serve 4,000+ delegates across 61 countries worldwide, continuing to expand HPAIR’s 30 year mission of democratizing information by connecting the leaders of today with the future leaders of tomorrow. Throughout their tenure, Business Insider dubbed HPAIR “The Davos of Harvard” for the caliber of Fortune 500 CEOs, government leaders, global celebrities, and world-class academic researchers who were welcomed at their conferences (full list).
At Harvard, Zeel conducts life sciences research at the Broad Institute of Harvard & MIT, and formerly was affiliated with the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics pursuing machine learning work. He has spent time working at McKinsey & Co, Microsoft A.I., and building a digital health startup called Evera. His interests lie at the intersection of the life sciences and computing, and enjoys reasoning through frontier technologies at that nexus.
In his free time, Zeel enjoys playing basketball (cheering proudly for the Toronto Raptors), training for his private pilot license, and travelling to new countries with old friends.
Eric Lin
Former PRESIDENT of HPAIR (2020 - 2021)
FORMER Director of Corporate Relations (2019 - 2020)
+ Biography
Eric Lin is a 4th-year student at Harvard University, graduating in May 2022 with a B.A. and M.S. in Computer Science. In his tenure co-leading HPAIR along with Zeel Patel, Eric pushed for greater accessibility through the democratization of HPAIR’s conferences and resources. He’s proudest of the team’s efforts for digital expansion in the face of COVID-19 uncertainty and spearheaded efforts such as the launch of HPAIR+ and the HPAIR shop to extend the reach of the organization beyond conferences.
At Harvard, Eric has published several papers on privacy-centric and trustworthy AI. He believes aligning machine learning techniques with societal needs is the key to the next technological breakthrough, and has worked on building empathetic AI systems at numerous startups and big tech companies.