 Henry
Tang
Chairman of the Committee of 100
Interview by AC Team's Mario Machado
Technical Requirements
To watch this clip, you will need to install the latest
version of RealPlayer.
Download your free RealPlayer
now!
 Click here for video
Mario: You've been
at the helm of this organization how many years, sir?
Henry Tang:
I've been chairman for three years.
Mario: And is this a good turnout
for you in Los Angeles.
Henry:
It's an excellent turnout, because it highlights the contributions
of Asian Americans in, well, the forefront of American technology.
And a lot of it, as you can see today, is related to the Internet,
and many of our Asian American friends are starting and active in
Internet companies, venture capital companies, and some of them
have of course reached a lot of notoriety.
For instance, Jerry Yang of Yahoo! is one of our
members, John Chen, who is CEO of Sybase is here, and of course
there is the Charles B. Wong of Computer Associates whose had his
company for 25 years.
Mario: Who was on the news just
recently, and reportedly the highest paid executive in America.
Six hundred and fifty four million dollars a year.
Henry:
That was several years ago. I'm not intimate with his pay
package, but then I believe that has something to do with options
arrangements and things like that. These things happen once or twice
in an executive's life time.
Mario: Is there a deeper meaning
to the Committee of 100 other than the networking and the proliferation
of business deals? I mean is there something...
Henry:
Oh, most especially. We credit I. M. Pei, the famous architect,
as our founder, and the reason for that was that after Tiananmen,
I. M. Pei received three hundred requests for interviews on many
different subjects stretching all the way from economic progress
of China to human rights to business opportunities to Chinese Americans'
involvement in the United States. A whole myriad of questions.
I. M. Pei basically said, "I am merely one person,
primarily an architect. I would like to see a group formed with
many people," and we called it "Committee of 100" at that time.
We are now 120 people who had the expertise to answer these myriad
of questions, and that is exactly what we have done, and we will
continue to grow. So the Committee of 100 focuses on primarily
U.S.-China relations, the furtherance, and promotion of it, and
the betterment of it, as well as the Chinese American relations
with all the American people.
Mario: With all the substantial
names, and clout of those names that you have in either the board
of directors or in your general force, you are a political force.
Henry:
Well, I think the American public should look upon all Asians as
a potential political force. Committee of 100, of course, we're
very proud of our membership.
What distinguishes our membership is that every
single person has excelled in a very, very special pioneering effort
in their lives. Some of pioneering efforts, sometimes are in education,
or medicine, or the military, or academics, or nowadays very popular
like in business. But they have excelled and distinguished themselves
in a very special pioneering effort. They've done something new,
something first, and that's the special characteristic of our membership.
Mario: This is Henry Tang, Chairman
of the Committee of 100.
Thank you very much for joining
us today.
Henry:
My pleasure.
- End of Excerpts -
Other Interviews
Committee of 100 Chairman Henry Tang
Committee
of 100 Conference Chair Matt Fong
Committee
of 100 Governor and Former Chairman Shirley Young
East
West Bank Chairman, President and CEO Dominic Ng
Founder
of Chris Lee Productions Inc. Chris Lee
Founder
of Panda Management Company, Inc. Andrew Cherng
|
