HEC launches €100m drive to raise profile

To raise its international profile and help fulfil its ambition of becoming one of the top 10 ranked business schools in the world, HEC School of Management in Paris has launched a €100m fund-raising campaign.

The Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Paris – HEC’s parent company – is also investing a further €100m in the school’s infrastructure.

The school says that €40m has already been raised and it is confident it will reach its goal within its five-year target.

HEC is keen to lift its global presence and sees the capital campaign as a key part of its strategy. It will set aside €50m from the campaign to develop an endowment to give it a sustainable source of income.

Daniel Bernard, chairman of the HEC Foundation, acknowledges that, while the sum sounds small by US endowment standards, it is nevertheless a step in the right direction.

“It is for the future, to secure a sustainable income for the campus,” he says.

HEC has four main priorities under the umbrella of the fund-raising campaign.

Scholarships are to be made available for talented students and free tuition will be offered to students from low-income backgrounds. The school will foster links with top overseas universities and will co-operate with universities in France to try to attract a greater diversity of students.

Its second priority is to nurture innovative research, with some of the money earmarked for faculty recruitment. HEC plans to expand its permanent faculty from 105 to 130 professors by 2013 as well as increase the amount of visiting faculty by 20 per cent.

The school also intends to develop five centres of excellence to help in its research aims – leadership and decision sciences; management of innovation; financial markets and information; growth strategies; and sustainable development and social responsibility.

A further investment is to be made in teaching resources and state-of-the-art technological equipment.

The final strand of the school’s strategy is strengthening its international standing. In the Financial Times 2007 and 2008 Global MBA rankings, HEC stood in 18th place – already within reach of its stated goal of positioning itself in the top 10. In 2006 it was ranked 22nd.

“We want to improve both the reputation of the school and its campus,” says Mr Bernard.

With its dean, Bernard Ramanantsoa at the helm, HEC is raising its profile. This month the school is opening the third iteration of its executive MBA programme in Beijing. The new programme will run alongside the school’s EMBA in Paris, and HEC is also a partner in the Trium EMBA programme with NYU Stern in New York and LSE in London.

Last month, in a move designed to combine management and public sector education, HEC launched a double degree programme with Science Po Paris, the social sciences university. Graduates of the three-year programme, which includes a year’s tuition at each school and one year of internships, receive two masters degrees.