Hello to all our blog followers out there in internet land! Today proved to be very exciting and in our opinions the most informative day of business thus far. The morning started off with a grueling, yet fun walk in the 90+ degree heat to the Singapore office of Conoco Phillips. Here we were greeted by a current Elon student’s Dad, Glen Simpson president of the Asian Pacific market among other employees. We enjoyed this very interactive presentation because it was not only interesting but also brought our minds into play and taught us a lot. This energy company is the 3^rd largest in the U.S. with their headquarters in Texas. Their operations include the exploration, supply and refinement of the worlds fossil fuels. With 86 million barrels of oil being consumed a day the demand for this market is very high and thus there is ever expanding room for growth and development.

We walked the trading floor and met some of the crude traders such as Jeffrey (below).

The office was very organized and well maintained by its enthusiastic employees. Below is a picture of our entire group with Mr. Simpson in the main lobby of the office.

The morning activities had a lot to offer and were a fantastic experience however our day did not even end there! After some free time came our evening meeting with the Toyota Group (Motor Asia Pacific Market). The Singapore offices were recently added in 2001 and deal mainly with the Sales and Marketing efforts of the company. Currently the Singapore offices house 150 employees of various cultural backgrounds due to the global presence of the company. We had the honor of attending a presentation of the Toyota Asian market conveniently located in our hotel market by a former Elon graduate Hillary. In her 3 years with the company she has been able to make a generous impact in streamlining the dealership customer relationship management. She and her other two colleagues were also able to expand on the growing need for commercial and non-commercial vehicles in India and the Philippines. Overall it was a very insightful and educational day that could only be reached by this firsthand experience.