Earlier this year, MTN was ranked as the only African brand in the BrandFinance Global 500 list... During the 2nd quarter of this year, MTN was recognised as the most socially responsible brand in the country... In the first half of 2011, the MTN brand has been rated as the country’s most valuable brand, according to a league table of both African and South African brands compiled by Brandirectory.

Last week I had the opportunity to lead a session on Corporate Diplomacy for the USC Center on Public Diplomacy’s Summer Institute. It is always a pleasure and humbling experience to engage with global public diplomacy practitioners and this summer’s group was no different.

Today the significant opportunity in brand building is to maximize one idea across the globe, to create an inspirational rallying cry for a global consumer movement. It isn’t easy to communicate across different cultures and countries while having one overall brand that really makes an impact.The digital revolution is about getting people to love your brand, no matter where they are in the world.

The BMW Guggenheim Lab is part think tank, part open-air forum, part community center. New York will be the first stop for the lab on a worldwide tour that will also include Berlin and Mumbai. In each city curators will invite leaders in fields including architecture, art, design, technology, education and science to participate in programs: lectures, workshops, games, performances and film screenings.

"..industry should focus on promoting independent innovation and core competence to grapple with increasingly stiff challenges," Zhang said. He further suggested that sectors such as the auto industry...should enhance soft power to build brand names and compete in the overseas market.

The world's second-largest restaurant chain announced a venture with a local company in the United Arab Emirates that will lower McDonald's carbon footprint by converting its frying oil into biodiesel. It is the first time that a company in the oil-rich Middle East has used biodiesel to power vehicles on this scale

Chinese Internet company Baidu says it has reached an agreement with Microsoft to provide English-language results generated by the U.S. software company's Bing search engine. The agreement, announced Monday, will automatically direct English search requests to Bing and its results will be displayed in pages in Baidu's search engine.

Economic Diplomacy requires application of technical expertise that analyzes the effects of a country’s economic situation on its political climate and economic interests. The foreign business leaders as well as government decision-makers work together on some of the most cutting edge issues in foreign policy... as well as in the more traditional areas of trade and finance.