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With notable prescience, Shyam Sunder, the James L. Frank Professor of Accounting, Economics, and Finance at Yale SOM co-authored an editorial in the Financial Times with Stella Fearnley of Bournemouth University on August 23, 2007, warning of dangers from converging accounting models.

In 2005, Lenovo, China’s largest PC maker, acquired IBM’s worldwide PC business. The company inherited nearly $10 billion in annual sales, but faced the challenge of introducing itself to millions of consumers.

Soltage is one company looking to finance the widespread adoption of clean, cheap solar power.

When interviews for the print edition of Q4 were conducted in April through August 2008, sovereign wealth funds seemed like a potential source of stability in the global financial system, due to their large pools of available capital. But when credit markets froze and stocks tumbled, SWFs seemed to stay on the sidelines. Rachel Ziemba is an analyst with RGE Monitor specializing in the strategies of SWFs. She provides her perspective on what these funds have been doing during the global economic turmoil.

Sovereign wealth funds have become a source of controversy. They have the size — several trillion dollars and growing — to swing or stabilize markets. Meanwhile, their sometimes secretive strategies have invited worries that they could be used as tools of government policy. Jeffrey E. Garten, former SOM dean and former undersecretary of commerce for international trade, talked to Ng Kok Song, the managing director and group chief investment officer at the Government of Singapore Investment Corporation, about how one of the world’s largest SWFs is run.

The nonprofit sector is developing tools for financing and managing the organization that come largely from the for-profit world. Clara Miller, president and CEO of the Nonprofit Finance Fund discusses both the need for more financial savvy in the nonprofit realm as well as the pitfalls of an overly commercial mindset.

Larry Summers has analyzed macroeconomic policies as a top academic economist, and helped form those policies in positions such as secretary of the treasury. He provides his take on the new forms of capital that are likely to affect markets, economies, and lives in the years ahead.

Why is a venture capital firm encouraging the employees in a company it funds to give free music lessons? They’re trying to prove the thesis that companies that engage with their communities also reap a business advantage.

Two decades ago, socially motivated investing accounted for a tiny percentage of worldwide capital. Today, investors representing $14 trillion have signed on to the UN’s Principles for Responsible Investing. What influence are they having?

Ernesto Zedillo, the former president of Mexico and a scholar at Yale, argues that overreacting to fears about sovereign wealth funds could hobble the global financial system. But he also points to the real risks inherent in the global imbalances that have fueled the recent growth of SWFs.