Hugo Yan, GMBA Class of 2018

This article is part of a series covering Tsinghua Student Dialogues with Advisory Board Members. These dialogues took place on October 20, 2016, in association with the larger Tsinghua SEM 2016 Advisory Board Meeting.

Esquel Group Chairman Marjorie Yang offers input on startup pitches and corporate social responsibility during her visit to Tsinghua’s x-lab.

During her recent visit to Tsinghua’s x-lab, Ms. Marjorie Yang, Chairman of vertically integrated multi-national textile manufacturing company the Esquel Group, held face-to-face exchanges with startup teams and shared her ideas on corporate management and innovation with a select group of student attendees. 

After a short tour led by Ms. Donghui Mao, Executive Director of x-lab, three startup teams introduced their projects and products to Ms. Yang. Xuan Wang, founder of Bluepha, a technology company incubated in the x-lab, studied at Tsinghua University School of Life Sciences. He shared his team’s commitment to the research and development of low-cost biodegradable materials in an effort to solve problems such as the long degradation periods of traditional plastic packaging. With Bluepha’s innovative materials, their plastic products can degrade completely and naturally within several months. These materials are currently being used in plastic packages and agricultural mulch film. Ms. Yang showed great interest in the pitch and pointed out that the agricultural mulch film used in the Xinjiang cotton farms of her company, the Esquel Group, would have solid potential for incorporating Bluepha’s products. Ms. Yang said Esquel uses a large amount of plastic for mulch films and the packaging bags of shirts and that the company has been looking for alternatives for packaging that are more eco-friendly.

Pengfei Xiao, founder of Beijing Neatrition Inc., from Tsinghua University Peking Union Medical College, also presented his startup business. Beijing Neatrition focuses on research and services in new materials, and its nano soil layer material provides an interrelated body of waterproof, inkproof and oilproof surfaces for materials. Pengfei explained that materials of Neatrition were simulated from the surface structure of the lotus leaf, enabling the surfaces of all objects to form a resistance to other substances, like clean lotus leaves growing from a muddy pond. The material can be utilized in such fields as PV glass, glass curtain wall, textiles, and metals. It has already been adopted to an extent in countries like Ukraine and Japan. The company is also collaborating with the People's Liberation Army General Logistics Department. Ms. Yang was particularly interested to understand the impact of this product on cotton textiles. Pengfei explained that Beijing Neatrition’s products, in contrast with general water-proofing agents, could actually enhance the hydrophobic characteristic of materials without changing other characteristics and shared his hope for collaboration with the Esquel Group.

The third team to present was x-lab-incubated Beijing T-cair Technology, which was once visited and positively received by Premier Keqiang Li. In the presentation, Long Zhao, founder of Beijing T-cair Technology, shared his intelligent water washing air purification project with the audience. The company focuses on purification of air contamination and optimization of air comfort. Different from traditional filtration-type air purifiers, however, its products utilize a method of simulating natural rain to purify haze or air contamination. Currently, the project has obtained the support of local governments in Beijing and Nanjing and obtained two rounds of seed and angel financing.

Afterwards, Ms. Yang, herself an entrepreneur engaging in corporate management and innovation for several decades, shared her views on the topic of innovation. She put forth that there are two major problems in today’s society, one being the combination of climate change and pollution, the other being the problem of the widening wealth gap. Using her own company, the Esquel Group, as an example, she explained the role of innovation in solving these two major problems in a seemingly traditional industry. Ms. Yang said Esquel has the capacity to treat over 10,000 tons of industrial sewage every day and is cooperating with other companies to explore innovative technologies for more efficient sewage treatment to further reduce environmental hazards. In addition, she pointed out that the textile and apparel industry’s “reworking” phenomenon – the remaking of clothes due to defects – could be prevented, and the corresponding pollutants generated could therefore be reduced if more qualified products could be achieved through improved company management and other internal innovations. Ms. Yang noted that Esquel had a strong interest in the utilization of new materials for buttons. Using the example of a European company that produces shirt buttons with milk, she pointed out that the utilization of new degenerative raw materials in traditional industries could effectively avoid contamination.

In the textile industry, Ms. Yang said that the chemical dyeing method, although quick and cheap, is less environmentally friendly, while the traditional organic dyeing method, though more environmentally friendly, presents color constraints. Esquel is currently studying a new method to combine the advantages of the two dyeing methods.

On the issue of how technological innovation might affect employment, Ms. Yang shared her view that technological innovation should serve to improve the production capacities of employees rather than replace them. A win-win situation could be achieved from technological innovation, and the income of grass-roots workers could be not only preserved but improved, as long as technologies are utilized well. Citing the example of the Esquel Group’s garment factory, she noted that automation reduced manual input but did not cause reduction in income or unemployment of workers. On the contrary, the income of workers in her company has been increasing, and those increases offer one way to help solve the problem of the widening wealth gap. Ms. Yang added that many workers did not know how to utilize technologies or have a sound technology foundation, but the Esquel Group teaches employees systematic thinking and encourages employees to participate in the application of new technologies.

After her speech, Ms. Yang continued engaging with the audience and conducted a quick Q&A session. At the end of the session, Ms. Donghui Mao presented a commemorative plaque to Ms. Yang as a token of appreciation and expressed a desire for continued collaboration with the Esquel Group in the future.