Session 6: All You Ever Wanted to Know About China but were too Afraid to Ask

Moderator and Speaker Biographies

MODERATOR: Michelle Chan

Michelle is a leading TMT lawyer, providing strategic, corporate and commercial advice to major players in the APAC region, including China and Hong Kong. She has more than 18 years of experience in working on corporate, commercial and regulatory matters. Recent projects she has advised on cover a range of disruptive technologies, including legal issues surrounding Big Data, Fintech, including online payment services and Internet of Things. On the media side, she has experience advising European football clubs, digital media rights holders, channel providers (traditional and internet) and game developers on a range of legal matters including online streaming, capital raising, regulatory and other legal matters. 

Dennis Cai

Mr. Dennis Cai has 13 years’ experience in international arbitration, mediation, E-commerce, and online intellectual property dispute resolution. Mr. Cai is currently the President of Policy and Compliance of Dot Trademark TLD Holding Company Limited since May 2016. Before that, he worked for the Hong Kong International Arbitration Centre (HKIAC) in the past the 12 years. During his tenure with the HKIAC, he served as the Assistant Secretary-General for 8 years, involving in various functions of the HKIAC Secretariat. Mr. Cai is a member of the Hong Kong Institute of Arbitrators (HKIArb), Licensing Executive Society China (Hong Kong Sub-Chapter), and Hong Kong Institute of Directors (HKIoD). He is also a holder of two master’s degrees, respectively L.L.M (WTO and Globalization Laws) and M.A in Arbitration and Dispute Resolution form Hong Kong. He has delivered 120+ public presentations, lectures, and trainings in Hong Kong, Mainland China and overseas, and published more than 15 articles, chapters, and case reports on arbitration and Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR).

Elaine Ann:

Elaine Ann is the Founder and Director of Kaizor Innovation, a strategic innovation consultancy that helps companies strategize, research, and define innovative products and services for the China market. Born and raised in Hong Kong and having lived in the U.S for 12 years, Elaine’s bilingual, bi-cultural and international background helps companies understand and strategize new product and services for the China market.

She is a veteran of the early dot-com era in the mid 90's having lived and worked in the U.S. for 12 years. She has worked for companies such as Razorfish, Philips Design, Henry Dreyfuss in New York, Silicon Valley and San Francisco and have designed the User Experiences of some of the very early Internet/technology businesses such as Schwab.com, Intuit's Quicken, the first Philips MP3 player and Philips Networked Home etc. in the 90's. Elaine also trains executives and students alike on New Product/Services Innovation and User Experience. Elaine is the User Experience Instructor of the Google EYE (Empowering Young Entrepreneurs) Program of Chinese University in Hong Kong in 2014 training up 400 Entrepreneurs on User Experience and Design Innovation.

She is currently the Honorary Project Director for the Centre of Entrepreneurship of the Chinese University and is in the Cyberport Expert Network mentoring Tech Startups on User/Customer-Centric Innovation and User Experience (UX) as well as mentor at The Cage of Lane Crawford Joyce Group, Blueprint and Cocoon. Elaine is also on the Advisory Committee and taught at two of the major design schools in Hong Kong: the Hong Kong Polytechnic University School of Design and the Hong Kong Design Institute. She also teaches the Executive Masters in Innovation Leadership at PolyU School of Design and MBAs at HKUST on Lifestyle Innovation. In 2014, she setup the WOW-X User Experience Bootcamp to train up both Startups and Designers bridging to Angel Investors: wowx.kaizor.com. And in 2015, organised the UX China Tour www.chinauxtour2015.com visiting 18 Chinese companies in 5 China cities including Alibaba, Tencent, Baidu, WeChat etc. Recently, also organised the Experience Digital China - 1 Day Shenzhen Live Class to introduce the latest mobile/digital lifestyle in China that impacts many business decisions: www.digitalchina.kaizor.com.

She was also the Vice Chairman of the Hong Kong Designers Association in 2012-2014 and active member for the past 10 years. She is currently one of the core organisers of IxDAHK Interaction Designers Association of Hong Kong and the association has expanded since 2006 to currently 2000 followers on Facebook/Meetup Group.

Elaine graduated from Carnegie Mellon University with a BFA in Visual Communication Design and Masters in Interaction Design. She is also an EMBA alumni of the Cheung Kong Business School (Beijing) and Stanford Executive Education Design Thinking Bootcamp's alumni.

Sheng Huang

Sheng Huang is a senior associate with Covington & Burling LLP Beijing office. He has extensive experience in intellectual property laws, specializing in patent and trade secret litigations. He assists international and Chinese clients with their intellectual property issues in China and the United States. He also helps the international and Chinese clients resolve their global high-profile IP disputes spanning in different jurisdictions and continents. Sheng is dual-qualified to practice the laws in China and California.