The New Nature of Business

Acknowledgments

From André: Thank you to my father for teaching me about natural capital, to my mother for alerting me at an early age about the importance of social capital, and to my wife Rosalie for helping me to build huge stores of human capital. You made me who I am and inspired this book.

Thus equipped I journeyed through life and its many pitfalls and opportunities with a curious and open attitude. I was able to connect with many fascinating people and their opinions. They are probably too many for an exhaustive list. All those aha! moments were inspired by meetings, readings, and events, and I am sure that those who helped me to progress the new nature of business are aware of how they contributed to this book.

I must single out my coauthor Peter. Our sessions and our correspondence about so many aspects of our manuscript have really brought us both much further than I thought possible when we started. Thank you.

The last 20 years of my life have been heavily influenced by my election to the board of Hoffmann La Roche. Fritz Gerber, Franz Humer, Gottlieb Keller, Severin Schwan, and many more were a constant help, as well as my co-board member—and particularly my cousin—Andreas Oeri.

At the same time, I started developing a portfolio of activities both within health care and in other activities. Here as well allow me to single out a couple of individuals. Claude Martin at WWF; Jorgen Randers at WWF and later Fondation du Tour du Valat; Sir John Krebs at Tour du Valat ...