Prof Dr M. Nawaz Sharif, a US based internationally famed expert on technological innovation and technology transfer, arrived in city on Monday to address as the lead speaker in a conference titled 'Bangladesh Industries Globalization Initiative (BIGI)'. The conference will be held on June 12 and 13 at the Banquet Hall of Daffodil Tower in the city's Dhanmondi area.

Sharif will also provide baseline information at the conference being organised by Daffodil International University. Also labeled as 'Innovation Stakeholder Consultative Conference', the discourse will focus on forming a technological innovation management centric initiative for building an innovation economy carrying an underlying message 'From Technology Information to Innovation Economy'.

Chaired by Daffodil Group of Enterprises Chairman M Sabur Khan, Industries Secretary Md Abdul Halim will be the chief guest at the conference while Bangladesh Small and Cottage Industries Corporation (BSCIC) Chairman Md Mustaq Hassan will be a special guest, said a press release on Saturday. There will be three sessions on the opening day which will focus on enriching understanding through fusion of unique perspectives of stakeholders. Four more sessions will take place on the concluding day to arrive at a composite landscape of opportunities and predicaments.

M. Nawaz Sharif is currently a Principal Consultant for Technology Management in Myriad Solutions Inc, Maryland, USA. In the recent past, he served as an Adjunct Professor in the Engineering Professionals Program of the Johns Hopkins University (JHU) and a Visiting Professor in the Project Management Program of the George Washington University (GWU). Earlier, he was a Management of Technology Chair Professor and the Vice President for Academic Affairs (Provost) of the Asian Institute of Technology (AIT) of Bangkok, Thailand. He also served as the Director of the UN-ESCAP's Asian and Pacific Center for Transfer of Technology (APCTT), Bangalore, India; and a Doctoral Program Director of the Graduate School of Management and Technology (GSMT) at the University of Maryland University College (UMUC), Adelphi of Maryland.

Professionally, Dr. Sharif was engaged in numerous science and technology for economic development related project consultancy work sponsored by the World Bank, ADB, IDB, UNDP, UNESCO and UNIDO. He has authored a number of books on the technology integrated economic development subject and published a large number of technical papers in the US and UK based professional journals. As an academic researcher in the area of technology management studies, he has developed a number of original frameworks for managing technological innovation at the industrial enterprise level and governance of technological innovation at the national level for sustainable development in the current globalized setting of competitive economic-social-cultural-and-political interdependence.