Former Dean Antonio Borges passed away on August 25

Objet: Former Dean Antonio Borges passed away on August 25

Antonio Borges, former Dean of INSEAD, passed away on August 25, 2013

 

With deep sorrow we have learnt that Antonio Borges passed away on August 25.

 

Born in Portugal in 1949, Antonio joined INSEAD as an Associate Professor of Economics in 1980 after obtaining his PhD at Stanford University and working at Stanford for a few years.

 

Soon thereafter he held the position of Academic Dean of INSEAD for the MBA program from 1986 to 1990 : this was a time of great expansion of the INSEAD MBA, rated by Fortune magazine as the best MBA outside the US. In 1988, Antonio Borges appeared on the cover of Fortune and this gave a great visibility to INSEAD.

 

In 1990, Antonio went back to Portugal and became Deputy Governor of the Bank of Portugal until 1993, when he returned to INSEAD to become co-dean until 1995 and then single dean from 1995 to 2000.

 

During his deanship, INSEAD achieved the largest fund raising campaign for a European business school with 120 M € collected. This allowed a great development of research through the creation of 20 academic chairs and several research funds.

 

In 1996 he started to work on an ambitious project : he recommended that INSEAD, which had been active in Asia since 1980 through the Euro Asia Center, should build a full-service, equal-status campus in Asia and create the concept of “One School, Two campuses”.

 

The plan, which many considered as very risky, was approved by the Board in 1998 and the Singapore campus opened in September 2000. Since then, it has been extremely successful and has become a major contribution of INSEAD in a globalized world.

 

In 2000, just after the inauguration of the new campus, Antonio left INSEAD to become one of the leaders of Goldman Sachs International where he stayed until 2008.

 

Then he held several official positions in London, in Washington and in Lisbon. In particular he spent a year in 2011 at the International Monetary Fund as the director in charge of European affairs.

 

During the last year he was an advisor to the government of Portugal for the program of privatizations.

 

Yesterday, the President of Portugal, H.E. Anibal Cavaco Silva, paid a tribute to Antonio Borges as “one of the brightest economists of his generation”.

 

In 1972 Antonio married Isabel da Silva de Araujo Sobreira. They have three sons and one daughter. Their youngest son, Gonzalo, is currently studying at INSEAD to obtain his MBA this coming December.

 

The contribution of Antonio Borges to INSEAD is invaluable. He led the School at a time when globalization was becoming a reality and he grasped the implications it had for INSEAD, implementing radical changes that have dominated INSEAD’s history ever since.

 

We must all be extremely grateful to Antonio for his achievements. Without him INSEAD would not be what it is today.

 

Franz Humer

Chairman of the Board

 

Claude Janssen

Honorary Chairman of the Board