The Danish Chamber of Commerce in China is now accepting nominations for Business Person and Entrepreneur of the Year 2016 in China.
The Selection Committee relies on individual’s input to identify the right candidates: “Your help is crucial! You and the candidates don’t have to be members of the DCCC.”
The winners will be selected based on the following criteria:
Business Person of the Year
- A Candidate will have achieved significant results for his/her company and/or organization, representing continuity over a significant number of years (with attention being paid particularly to the last 3-5 years)
- A Candidate – respected in the Danish and Chinese business communities – has contributed to the understanding between Denmark and China and as such has acted as an ambassador for Danes and the Danish business community in China
- A Candidate going beyond their formal job duties to represent new ingenious ideas, which have – or will – benefit Danish ways of doing business.
Entrepreneur of the Year
- A Danish or Chinese national, located in China or Denmark who has made a substantial mark with a new important contribution and impact to Denmark and/or China during the last year(s)
- The Candidate should have endured personal risk to achieve success be it financial or otherwise
- The Candidate should be able to demonstrate a certain unique idea, knowledge, talent, or business concept with identifiable Sino-Danish elements which should be sustainable and have potential for growth and/or scalability
- The age of the Candidate is not decisive, but younger candidates and those who have reached early achievement should be favored
- The Candidate could be a business person, creative person, scholar or an artist.
In 2015 Lifetime Achievement Award laureate was Carsten Boyer Thøgersen, George Kahwati Business Person of the Year, and Nikolaj Schnoor Entrepreneur of the Year.
The winners will be celebrated at the gala party on Sat 22 October 2016 in Shanghai at Kempinski Hotel. Great Danish media celebrities – Monte Carlo hosts Esben Bjerre Hansen and Peter Falktoft – will be flown for the occasion to conduct the evening and entertain the guests.
The present sitting members of the selection committee and the members of the three DCCC Boards are excluded from nomination.
Suggestions should be sent to [email protected] with names, e-mail addresses and a note stating if the nomination is for Business Person of the Year or Entrepreneur of the Year. The candidates will later be asked to submit a detailed profile themselves.
The History Behind the Awards
Many people show outstanding performances in the development of Danish business in China. These achievements often go relatively unnoticed over several years by the general community and are typically performed by very dedicated, but also very modest individuals.
In 2007, the Danish Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai on behalf of the Danish Chambers in China therefore instituted the “Business Person of the Year” award to celebrate these individuals with deserved attention. It was followed by a second award “Entrepreneur of the Year” in 2009.
Every year, a nomination process will lead to a selection of the winners of the the two awards and they will be announced and celebrated at the awards ceremony.
At the award ceremony, the winners receive the “Vilhelm Award Statuette”. The statuette is named “Vilhelm” after the famous and industrious Danish entrepreneur Vilhelm Meyer who lived and worked in Shanghai from 1900 to 1935. The statuette is designed by the famous Danish designer Carsten Jorgensen and it represents the Nightingale from Hans Christian Andersen’s fairytale.
