History of ABL-SF

The Asian Business League of San Francisco (ABL-SF) is one of the first and oldest organizations in California devoted to the promotion of Asian Pacific Americans (APA) in business. Founded in 1980 by 25 young enterprising APA individuals, ABL-SF was formed as a membership nonprofit organization exempt from taxation under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code in order to best serve the APA interest in business. Its first program, which showcased successful APA entrepreneurs in the then nascent Silicon Valley in 1981, was greeted with immense support from the APA community. Over the course of many years since then, ABL-SF has been in the forefront of offering cutting-edge programs ranging from Pacific Rim conferences to entrepreneurial workshops to business networking sessions to community activity support. One of ABL-SF’s most enduring legacies of its event planning has been the annual Distinguished Asian Leadership Awards Dinner, which began in 1986 and held to recognize leadership achievements by individuals and organizations in the San Francisco Bay Area.

A principal hallmark of ABL-SF’s existence has been the evolution of its programming to fit the needs of its APA membership. Currently, ABL-SF’s mission is the promotion of APA leadership in business. In furtherance of this mission, ABL-SF engages in two principal activities. One is the Youth Program, which has been in existence since 1999 and consists of engaging successful APA individuals in business and other professions with high school students participating in a community organization-sponsored after-school program. The other consists of offering seminars, panel discussions, workshops and training programs devoted to leadership topics of interest in business.