Home Eco-nomics Consumers want luxury home appliance that are environmentally friendly. Jean Dufour, Chief Sales and Marketing Officer at BSH, the distributor of high-end brands like Gaggenau, talks about the latest trends. Can you tell us more about the BSH Group? It is a joint venture between Bosch and Siemens that specialises in home appliances. We also carry the luxury brands Gaggenau and Neff. How do you make your kitchen more eco-friendly? Choose a refrigerator that fits your storage needs and has the best energy rating. It consumes the most energy as it runs 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Then comes the washing machine. A front loader uses by far less water and energy than a top-loading one. It cleans much better too. Use a dishwasher as new generation machines use less than 11 litres of water per wash and less power for warm water. Lastly, use an induction cooker as they are more efficient by not wasting energy heating up the surroundings. What new green technologies will emerge? When you use the dishwasher, there will be clean water left from the last rinse cycle. We are exploring the possibility of keeping that in a reservoir to use it in the first cycle on the next wash. This reduces water consumption by two litres. Also, we are working on a way to extract the water collected from a tumble dryer to be used in the washing machine.

White Collared Fighters Today’s corporate warriors are taking their battles out of the boardroom and into the ring in the form of more exotic, and often more violent, forms of martial arts. For years, speak of Kung Fu and one either conjured up an image of guys with dragons tattooed on their backs performing secretive rituals in incense smoke-filled rooms or a wise sifu telling his apprentice that, after 20 years of training, he is finally ready to “go down the hill” to avenge the murder of his father. Not anymore. Today, there is an explosion in martial arts’ popularity among busy white-collared professionals who take up combat sports to stay fit and its image has been totally revamped. In fact, the martial arts these busy professionals are interested in include none of the old staples such as Judo, Karate, Aikido, Taekwondo or Wing Chun. Instead, they are learning Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ), Muay Thai and lately, Commando Krav Maga (CKM). The world of combat sports today is dominated by ultra-violent mixed-martial arts tournaments that incorporate martial arts like Muay Thai and BJJ. Once considered niche underground events, MMA tournaments like Ultimate Fighting Championships have turned mainstream and have overtaken more traditional spectator sports like boxing. This has led to many, including white-collar types, to take up these newer forms of fighting. “Eighty-five percent of our members are high-level executives,” says Chatri Sityodtong, managing director of the recently opened Evolve Mixed Martial Arts. “Instead of running on a treadmill in a gym, they come here for dynamic exercises in a fun and safe environment.” Sityodtong, himself an entrepreneur armed with a Harvard MBA, has practiced Muay Thai for 20 years.

Transforming Space From holding rock concerts and chess competitions at its business parks to entering new markets at a breakneck pace, Ascendas has been at the forefront of the business and industrial space sector in Asia. The company’s CEO Chong Siak Ching has led the organisation as its president and CEO since its creation in 2001 as an offshoot of JTC Corp. Whatever their initial reservations – she has occasionally been mistaken for the secretary during her overseas forays - senior executives and government officials from Manila to Mumbai have had to learn to deal with the woman behind Ascendas’ phenomenal growth in the past eight years. More often than not, they have benefited from her counsel. The company’s groundbreaking forays into India and the real estate investment trust (reit) business - high risk bets that have paid off handsomely – have distinguished Chong’s leadership and contributed to her winning the Outstanding CEO of the Year at this year’s Singapore Business Awards. In person, she comes across as calm and unassuming, but also clearly passionate about her company and its goals. These traits have served her well in growing her company into Asia’s leading provider of business space. The numbers speak for themselves. From running two properties in Singapore, Ascendas now has investments in 10 countries and 33 cities. Its assets under management has grown at a breakneck speed, increasing eight-fold from $1.2 billion to around $9 billion.