From left, Dr. Nitin Afzulpurkar,
Prof. Worsak Kanok-Nukulchai,
Mrs. Tarita Mehendale, Mr. Adesh Gaekwad and Dr. Pritam K.
Shrestha.

Mrs. Tarita Mehendale, Founder Secretary and Chairperson of Indira
Group of Institutes (IGI), India and Mr. Adesh Gaekwad, Executive
Director, Project and Public Relation Trustee visited AIT and met with
Professor Worsak Kanok-Nukulchai, Dean, School of Engineering and
Technology, Dr Nitin Afzulpurkar, Associate Dean, SET, Dr. Pritam K.
Shrestha, Head-ERCO and Mr. Tenzin Rabgyal, Program Officer,
ERCO.

Mrs.

AIT President Prof. Said Irandoust visited
the NanoThailand
Symposium 2008 with Vice President for Research, Prof. S. K.
Rakshit. Prof. Vilas Wuwongse, Vice President for External Relations
also
visited the exhibition on the morning of the November 6th.

AIT President
Prof. Said Irandoust addresses
capacity crowd at the CSR Asia Summit 2008 opening session.

Watch the summit online here:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjRDgwGqDew

CSR is good for Asian business in
uncertain economic times, keynote speakers stress
 

For two days last week the Asian Institute of Technology was the
final destination for representatives of global corporate giants and
civil society who arrived en masse to participate at the CSR Asia
Summit 2008, Asia’s most notable annual conference on the issue of
corporate social responsibility (CSR).

Organized by Hong Kong-based partner CSR Asia, the two-day conference
hosted by AIT Extension from 3-4 November brought together over 350
participants from Europe, North America and Asia, representing wide
array of social enterprises and private sector interests interested in
advancing the cause of CSR in the region.

Ms. Gunilla Eitrem, Senior Programme Officer,
Environment Policy Division, Department for Natural Resources and the
Environment of Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency
(SIDA), Stockholm visited AIT on 04 November 2008. Ms. Gunilla Eitrem
was recently deployed as AIT’s new contact person for Sida, Stockholm.

The Government of Finland is planning to start a cooperation program
with governments and
different local private sector actors in the countries surrounding the
Mekong river area
to help strengthen the use of renewable energy, enhance the mitigation
of climate change
and increase regional public-private partnerships in the field of
renewable energy.

 
Télécoms Sans Frontières (TSF) deployed a
team of emergency telecommunications specialists in response to the
recent 6.5 magnitude earthquake in Pakistan. The TSF team includes a
volunteer from the Asian Institute of Technology, a Relief Web press
release said.

To draw international and domestic media attention to the
CSR Asia Summit 2008 which AIT is hosting from 3-4 November, last week
on October 27 President Said Irandoust represented the Institute as a
panelist at a major press conference at the Foreign Correspondents’
Club of Thailand (FCCT) in downtown Bangkok.

In conjunction with the Southeast and South Asia and Taiwan
Universities (SATU) Presidents' Forum, the first SATU
2008 Youth Forum took place at the National Cheng
Kung University (NCKU) from 9-12 November 2008.
This Youth Forum aims to encourage students to think outside of the box
and empower them to speak out and be heard.

Above from left: 
Dr. Rungruang Limchoopatipa, president of the Software
Industry Promotion Agency 
and Professor Said Irandoust, president of the Asian
Institute of Technology at the signing ceremony.

The Asian Institute of Technology (AIT) and the
Software Industry Promotion Agency (SIPA) have agreed
to a five-year partnership agreement designed to strengthen Thailand’s
computer software industry and enhance its long-term competitiveness as
a regional technology hub.

Above from left: Dr.
Andras Vedres, IFIA president and
Dr. Siriwan Suebnukarn

An AIT and Thammasat University collaboration on the
intelligent clinical training system named COMET, recently bagged the
gold medal during the world competition of Computer Implemented
Invention (CII). The competition was organized by the
International Federation of Inventors' Association
(IFIA) and took place at the International Invention
Exhibition, Su Zhou, China on 16-19 October
2008. 

This project was jointly developed by an AIT
alumnus Dr. Siriwan Suebnukarn who is now an
Assistant Professor at Thammasat University’s Dental School and
an AIT adjunct Assistant Professor in the School of
Engineering and Technology, together with Prof.