GEWEL OPEN HOUSE 2008 Vol.2
Global Summit of Women held in Hanoi
Impressions on the Summit from each participant

GEWEL held the second annual Open House on July 23rd, 2008 on the 20th floor event hall of Shinsei Bank with the gorgeous view of central Tokyo.
This time the meeting was held to provide a report on the Global Summit of Women held in Hanoi, Vietnam from June 5th to 7th, 2008.
The Global Summit of Women is often called “DAVOS for Women” and it has been held all over the world since 1990 and has a history of 18 years. Last year it was held in Berlin. Next year it will be held in Chile.

The participants are female business leaders, professionals, female leaders in governmental agencies providing aid, and the Summit provides a place for substantial and productive international network. In addition, it also serves as Women’s EXPO (Wexpo) where female entrepreneurs can promote their businesses.

GEWEL asked the participants to the Summit to make their own presentations at this Open House. Despite the same Summit, the difference in each presenter's viewpoints is clearly shown, providing the audience with many valuable insights.

The presentations consisted of a wide range of reports, such as the understanding for business development obtained from actual intimate discussions with the local people, deep and warm-hearted interactions with the Vietnamese people that cannot be experienced from just sightseeing, being able to reach out to anyone at the Summit because of having the same purpose or values, expansion of network of female business leaders working for global companies, new perspectives as an NGO gained through the conversations with the people in Hanoi city, finding a business partner at the very first participation to the Summit and starting up her own business, being energized by females who are dynamic (trying to be active) in the global world, and attaining personal growth by participating in the Summit every year. The 20th Floor of the Shinsei Bank was filled with high energy and lots of power.

The networking session after the presentations was also very vigorous and exciting, influenced by the power of the presenters and continued to the last minute of the closing time.

Report by Konishi

The presentation started by Ms. Mariko Nakazono’s greeting.
She is the head of CLO (Chief Learning Office) of Shinsei Bank.

Ann Sado, Vice President of GEWEL, served as the MC,
introducing the presenters and the Summit outline.

The following are the presenters in chronological order.


Ms. Sachiko Tanaka, President of I.N.O.
(First time participant to gather information on global business and networking.)

Ms. Tomoko Moriya, President of SSL Powered Service,
former chairman of Foreign and Japanese Female Engineers Forum
(First time participant to experience a summit that is not targeted for engineers.)

Ms. Noriko Arai, Deputy General Manager,
Aon Global Client Network Dept., Aon Risk Service Japan Co., Ltd.
(Second time participant. President of Aon Vietnam made a presentation at the Youth Forum.)

Ms. Masako Arakane, President of Qualia
(Second time participant whose company supports
women’s career advancement in Osaka)

Ms. Nana Gentle, President of NGO Gospel-Hiroba (Plaza)
(First time participant representing NPO JKSK of
Ms. Mitsu Kimata [GEWEL advisor] as their member)

Ms. Mineko Hasegawa, President of InDream Inc.
(Participant at WEXPO every year as an entrepreneur from the Seoul Summit in 2004)

Ms. Mariko Takaku,
Senior Manager of IT/Technology Consulting Div., Accenture
(First time participant with two other colleagues)

Ms. Ruriko Nomura, President of Hopes, Inc.
(Participant every year from Hong Kong Summit in 2001
as an entrepreneur and presented about Mr. Kawai,
who received the Best Entrepreneur Award
for the first time from Japan in Hanoi)