Haiyan Wang
Boards are being asked to defend a China and India strategy at the same time as they are being asked to de-risk one. The decisions cluster around capital, supply chains and market access, but the underlying question is more uncomfortable: which globalisation are we still in, and which one are we leaving. Without a credible read on that, growth plans drift and risk committees over-correct.
Haiyan Wang is a globalisation strategist and Managing Partner of the China India Institute who helps multinationals make defensible long-range decisions about China, India and the wider emerging markets.
Full Profile
Why organisations work with Haiyan Wang
- A research-grounded view on the China and India axis from a co-founder of the China India Institute, built on three decades of work on global strategy with Anil K. Gupta.
- Authority drawn from a 200-corporation study underpinning The Quest for Global Dominance (2nd Edition) and the Axiom Award-winning Getting China and India Right.
- A serious counter-position to the standard “deglobalisation” narrative: the argument that trade is shifting toward data, IP and services rather than retreating, sharpened in her 2024 Thinkers50 Hall of Fame work.
- Translates emerging-market signals into board-level capital, supply chain and market-entry choices, not country-trend commentary.
- Recognised by named bodies that buyers trust: Thinkers50 Hall of Fame inductee (2024), Thinkers50-ranked thinker, Axiom Book Awards Silver Prize.
Biography highlights
- Managing Partner and co-founder, China India Institute, Washington DC
- Adjunct Professor of Strategy, INSEAD
- 2024 Thinkers50 Hall of Fame inductee (with Anil K. Gupta)
- Co-author of The Quest for Global Dominance (2nd Edition), Getting China and India Right (Axiom Awards Silver Prize, 2009) and The Silk Road Rediscovered
- Regular columnist for Bloomberg Businessweek, blogger for Harvard Business Review, with bylined pieces in the Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, Wired, China Daily, Times of India and South China Morning Post
- Holds graduate degrees from the University of International Business and Economics (China) and the University of Maryland at College Park
Biography
The cheap-globalisation era is over, but globalisation itself is not. That is the working thesis behind the China India Institute, the Washington DC research and advisory firm Haiyan Wang co-founded and runs as Managing Partner. Her argument, developed across three decades with Anil K. Gupta, is that the flow of physical goods is plateauing while the flow of data, intellectual property and services is accelerating. Boards that read the first signal without the second are making the wrong calls on capital allocation and footprint.
The argument is anchored in a long-running research programme on global strategy, including a study of more than 200 corporations that underpins The Quest for Global Dominance (2nd Edition), co-authored with Gupta and Vijay Govindarajan. Getting China and India Right took the Axiom Book Awards Silver Prize for globalisation and international business in 2009. The Silk Road Rediscovered, written with Gupta and Girija Pande, examines how Indian and Chinese companies are using each other’s markets, a question most Western firms still treat as separate problems.
Wang’s standing is recognised by the bodies senior buyers actually weigh. She and Gupta were inducted into the Thinkers50 Hall of Fame in 2024, after appearing in the Thinkers50 ranking (most recently cited at #25 in 2021) and being shortlisted for Thinkers50 awards. She has held an Adjunct Professor of Strategy role at INSEAD and writes regularly for Bloomberg Businessweek and Harvard Business Review, with bylined commentary in the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times, the Times of India and the South China Morning Post.
For a senior team trying to set a five-year stance on China, India and the next layer of emerging markets, the value is concrete: a credible read on which parts of globalisation are stalling, which are intensifying, and where that leaves a specific company’s growth and risk decisions.
Key speaking topics
- Globalisation in a phase change
- China and India as strategic markets
- Emerging-market diverging futures
- Multinational strategy and global presence
- Global mindset for senior leadership
- Geopolitics and the rules-based economy
- Long-range scenario thinking on global trade
Ideal for
- CEOs, CSOs and board directors setting multi-year China and India exposure
- Heads of strategy, corporate development and M&A in multinationals
- Risk committees and supply chain leaders reassessing globalisation assumptions
- Investor and asset-management forums on emerging markets and capital allocation
Audience outcomes
- A clear read on which parts of globalisation are retreating and which are intensifying
- A defensible frame for board-level decisions on China, India and other emerging markets
- A working view of where data, IP and services flows are creating new commercial ground
- A sharper test for capital allocation and footprint choices under geopolitical pressure
- Reference points from the long China India Institute research programme that buyers can use in their own strategy reviews
Talks
A senior-leader briefing on the structural drivers reshaping the global economy and what they mean for corporate strategy.
Key takeaways:
- A working frame for the forces moving global growth, demographics and digitisation
- A view on where the pressure points sit for multinationals over the next decade
- A sharper test for which megatrend signals matter to a specific company
An argument that the era of emerging markets rising in tandem is over, with practical implications for portfolio choice.
Key takeaways:
- A read on which emerging economies are reforming and which are stalling
- Criteria for picking emerging-market bets at country and sector level
- A frame for stress-testing existing emerging-market exposure
A research-led session on how to build credible long-range strategies in the two markets that anchor Wang’s work.
Key takeaways:
- A grounded view of the China and India growth story beyond headline narratives
- The strategic differences between the two markets that boards repeatedly confuse
- A practical sequence for entering, scaling or rebalancing in either market
A working session on how to systematise global expansion while managing complexity and political risk.
Key takeaways:
- A structure for sequencing global expansion decisions
- A view on where global presence still creates advantage and where it has stopped
- A test for whether a current global footprint is paying for itself