“Can you hear me OK? It’s not a great line…” those were some of my first words to Frederik Paulsen, Jr. – the Chairman of Ferring Pharmaceuticals; a company he inherited as a small family concern (with revenues of around U$15 million), and which he turned into a global biopharmaceuticals company employing 6,000 people in over 60 countries (amassing himself a fortune estimated at U$7 billion).
The Story of Humanity’s Relationship With its Most Precious Resource. In this interview series we speak to Guy Ryder (Chair, UN-Water & Director General of the International Labour Organisation, ILO), Professor Steven Chu (Nobel Prize Winning Scientist & 12th U.S. Secretary of Energy), Dr Peter Gleick (President Emeritus & Chief Scientist, Pacific Institute), Christoph Gorder (President & Chief Water Officer, Charity Water), Professor Mark Zeitoun (Professor of Water Security and Policy, University of East Anglia), Barbara Frost (CEO, WaterAid), Professor Benedito Braga (President of the World Water Council) and Gary White (Co-Founder & CEO, Water.Org). We discuss how water has shaped our species, the scale of the global water crisis, how it’s impacting our species and environment, and how we can achieve a future where we have enough water for all of us, and all our needs.
My conversation with Usain Bolt – the world’s fastest man.
In this article we talk to Frank Willem (FW) de Klerk (Former President of South Africa and Winner of the Nobel Peace Prize), George Takei (Actor & Social Justice Activist), Prof. Githu Muigai (Attorney General of Kenya), Patrisse Cullors (Co-Founder of Black Lives Matter), Dr. Nils Muiznieks (the Council of Europe’s Commissioner for Human Rights), Nikesh Shukla (Author), Lord Herman Ouseley (Founder of ‘Kick it Out’) and Iby Knill (Holocaust Survivor). We discuss the impact of racism, discrimination and intolerance on our society, and how we can build a better future for our world.
On Portugal: A Conversation with H. E. António Costa, Prime Minister of Portugal
For the first time in over 20 years, I feel brown… I find myself being extra careful in terms of how I dress, where I go, how I speak, what I carry and how I behave; not to conform to any new social norms- but rather, so that people don’t mistake me for a terrorist, or make assumptions about my intentions. I am not the only brown person I know who has a ‘pre-flight shave’ at airports, nor the only one I know who is acutely aware of themselves on public transport.
In these exclusive interviews we speak to Sir Antony Gormley (One of the world’s most influential sculptors), Bear Grylls (Adventurer, TV Host & Author), Marina Abramović (internationally acclaimed performance artist), Sir Ken Robinson (widely considered to be the world’s foremost expert on creativity, innovation and human resources in education and business), Sadhguru (visionary, yogi & mystic), Sir Anish Kapoor (Internationally renowned artist and sculptor), Captain Alan Bean (NASA astronaut and artist, fourth person to walk on the Moon), Dan Pink (bestselling author and expert on human behaviour), Susan Cain (Author, Chief Revolutionary and Co-Founder of Quiet Revolution), Dr. Eric Thomas (World Renowned Author, Speaker, Educator and Pastor) and Robin Sharma (Leadership Expert, Author & Speaker). We discuss the essence of our life long journey of understanding our purpose, and who we are.
The Power of Poetry and the Written Word: In this exclusive series of interviews, we speak to Dr Maya Angelou (1928-2014, a celebrated poet, memoirist, novelist, educator, dramatist, producer, actress, historian, filmmaker, and civil rights activist), Sir Andrew Motion (Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom from 1999 to 2009, Founder of the Poetry Archive), Lemn Sissay MBE (Internationally acclaimed poet, and Chancellor of the University of Manchester), Saul Williams (internationally acclaimed rapper, poet and actor), George the Poet (Poet and spoken word performer), Yann Martel (multi award-winning author, best known for his internationally acclaimed work ‘Life of Pi’) and Tariq “Black Thought” Trotter (MC of ‘The Roots’, actor and lyricist).. We discuss the very fundamental question of why we write and explore the role of the written-word in culture, social change and the story of humanity itself.
A Conversation with Laurence Graff OBE, Founder of Graff Diamonds
A conversation with Troy Carter, the strategist and manager behind household names like Lady Gaga, John Legend, Meghan Trainor and Miguel; who is also a serial-entrepreneur and investor with holdings in companies including Spotify, Warby Parker, Songza, Dropbox, Fab and Uber.
Prof. Vikas Shah Interviews the world's leading thinkers, and the people shaping the century.
July 17, 2017Thought Economics