Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business announced today an ambitious international-expansion plan that will involve the simultaneous establishment of five new overseas campuses, in Dubai, London, New Delhi, Shanghai, and St. Petersburg.
The move will transform the school into “the first truly global business school, shaped and driven by the fundamental issues of our time,” its dean, Blair Sheppard, said in a written statement.
The Fuqua School’s first new international partnership, with the Graduate School of Management at St. Petersburg State University, was announced today, and details of the location of the campus in India will be disclosed next month.
“Partnerships with individuals, municipalities, and organizations will facilitate the simultaneous launch of the business school’s campuses in each of these five regions,” the statement announcing the initiative said. However, Duke’s approach to global expansion differs from that of other institutions in that it “calls for a significant presence in each location rather than the casual affiliations that define the international programs of most U.S. business schools,” Dean Sheppard said in the statement.
The “breadth and scale” of the new Duke venture sets it apart from other business schools’ overseas efforts, and Dean Sheppard, who took up his post just 16 months ago, “has been one of the most innovative architects of business programs,” the London-based Financial Times newspaper said in an article today. But the article pointed out that a previous attempt at overseas expansion failed when the Fuqua School “had to close its Frankfurt campus because it could not drum up enough business there.”
The school’s existing partnerships with overseas institutions may well be a complicating factor, the Financial Times said. For example, Duke has an existing relationship with the Indian Institute of Management in Ahmedabad, which is not part of the new plan, as well as with the London School of Economics and Political Science, whose role in the expansion has not yet been announced. The London School of Economics offers an executive M.B.A. program in conjunction with New York University’s Stern School of Business, which “could end up in direct competition with one of the Duke programs in London,” the Financial Times said. —Aisha Labi
