News & Features for 2010
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In Memory of W. Howard Lester
August 14, 1935 - November 15, 2010
The Lester Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation regrets to announce the passing of our Founding Benefactor, W. Howard Lester.
A quintessential entrepreneur, W. Howard Lester died Monday, November 15, 2010 at his home surrounded by his loved ones in Indian Wells, California after a 13-year long battle with cancer. He was a business icon, who for over 32 years guided the development and success of the Williams-Sonoma, Inc. portfolio of brands. Howard strove to improve the lives of others through his philanthropy. With his wife Mary, they supported education, medical research, youth programs and the arts. In 1991, he founded the Lester Center which now carries on his legacy of business enterprise. [read the full obituary] [read more]
- Magoosh, founded by Haas 2010 graduates Bhavin Parikh, Hansoo Lee, and Pejman Pour-Moezzi, came in second place November 18, 2010 in the 6th Annual Intel+UC Berkeley Technology Entrepreneurship Challenge, a partnership between the Lester Center and Intel Corporation. They competed against 26 other teams from 19 countries to win the $10,000 second prize. Magoosh gives aspiring graduate school students a more affordable, convenient, and effective way to prep for the GMAT, GRE, and LSAT. OsComp Systems of Pontificia Universidad Católica Madre y Maestra in the Dominican Republic took first place in the Challenge. The team of entrepreneurs won $25,000 from the Intel Foundation for inventing a breakthrough, patent-pending technology that could reduce operating and capital costs for natural gas compression by more than 30 percent. The $5,000 third-place prize went to ADTELLIGENCE of the University of Mannheim in Germany for its advertising targeting platform for the social web. The People’s Choice Award Winner was Bio-Oil from Tsinghua University in China, who aims to promote an alternative energy source while reducing pressure on the environment by producing biodiesel using various kinds of waste oil as raw materials. [read more]
- The Lester Center is proud to participate in the 2010 Global Entrepreneurship Week founded by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, the world’s largest foundation devoted exclusively to entrepreneurship. More than 7 million people and 18,000 organizations in 88 countries planned entrepreneurial activities in their local communities to celebrate. From 2008 to 2009, GEW doubled the number of participants and partner organizations, and increased its registered activities from 25,000 to almost 33,000 across the globe. The Lester Center will highlight its own Global Entrepreneurship Education Initiative during GEW with a program sponsored by Intel Corporation: the 6th Annual Intel+UC Berkeley Technology Entrepreneurship Challenge. From November 16-18, 2010, 27 teams from around the globe presented pitches on everything from bio-oil to breast cancer detection as they vies for $45,000 in prize money.
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Former Haas Lecturer Will Rosenzweig, co-founder of Physic Ventures and an active supporter of the Lester Center, has been honored with the 2010 Oslo Business for Peace Award for his leadership and innovative approach to creating successful businesses focused on personal health and sustainable living. Rosenzweig, the only American among seven winners this year, was presented the award last month by the Business for Peace Foundation and International Chamber of Commerce in Oslo, Norway. Winners are selected by a committee of Nobel Laureates, including Professor Muhammad Yunus, winner of the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize for his pioneering work in microfinance and his leadership of the Grameen Bank. [read more]
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Lester Center execuitive director Andre Marquis headed a panel on M&A and Innovation at the 4th annual 2010 Berkeley Finance Conference - Creating Value Through Mergers & Acquisitions, on Friday, November 19, 2010. Conference web site: http://www.berkeleyfinanceconference.com
- John Woolard (MBA 97) is making an impact in energy. His latest venture, BrightSource Energy, “develops utility-scale solar power projects that utilize its unique proprietary solar technology...to convert sunlight to electricity.” The venture has raised $160M in venture investments, and has contracted with PG&E and SCE to deliver more than 2,600 megawatts of electric power from fourteen solar power plants. In September and early October, 2010, BrightSource reached new landmarks, as the California Energy Commission and the Bureau of Land Management approved the construction of BrightSource's Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System, a 370 nominal (392 gross) megawatt project. When constructed, Ivanpah will nearly double the amount of solar thermal electricity produced in the United States today.
During his weekly national address on October 2, President Obama lauded the economic benefits of the Ivanpah project.
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- The Lester Center is pleased to announce the appointment of technology entrepreneur André Marquis (MBA 96) as our new executive director effective August 9th. André graduated from Haas in 1996. While getting his MBA he helped create the entrepreneurial venture Cybergold, an internet advertising company that later went public and ultimately was acquired by MyPoints. He subsequently started and served in executive positions for several more successful technology ventures including three in information technology and two in pharmaceuticals. Most recently he served as the senior vice president of sales and marketing at the neuromarketing company Innerscope Research in Boston, Mass. [read more]
- Lester Center Advisory Board member Jack Larson BS 73 (Business Administration) was recently honored with the Imagine America Foundation’s 2010 Pioneer Award. Larson, a 36-year veteran of the postsecondary education industry, was recognized for his innovative leadership and outstanding contributions to the field. [read more]
- In the 2010 UC Berkeley Business Plan Competition, Orpheus Medical was awarded the $20,000 grand prize plus a $5,000 first-place prize in the life sciences track. Orpheus Medical has created the first medical device that can painlessly cure hemorrhoids in a single procedure that can be performed by gastroenterologists without general anesthesia in their endoscopy suites. (more)
- From a record number of 500 Global Social Venture Competition plans received in 2010, sixteen teams with plans to produce both revenue and social change competed in the finals at the 11th Annual event. Re:Motion Designs, a Stanford University venture, won the $25,000 first prize. The team’s JaipurKnee is a polymer-based polycentric knee joint that can be manufactured for less than $20 and has been featured by Time Magazine and BusinessWeek as a major innovation of 2009. Haas’ WE CARE Solar beat out four other finalists vying for the Social Impact Assessment Prize, winning $5,000. The venture’s “solar suitcase” provides a plug-and-play system to obstetric health facilities in developing regions that powers lighting, mobile communication, and essential medical devices. (more)
- Recent news coverage of our successful entrepreneurs includes a signal honor: Danae Ringelmann, MBA 08 and co-founder of IndieGoGo, was named among the Most Influential Women in Technology by Fast Company magazine. Ringelmann, 32, was one of only eight women identified by Fast Company in the category of "The Entrepreneurs." The honor comes just more than a week after IndieGoGo was nominated for “best community site” for the 14th Annual Webby Awards. IndieGoGo is a crowd funding platform for all creative, cause, and entrepreneurial projects, from games and books to iPhone apps and charities. Since its launch, IndieGoGo has helped thousands of projects raise money across 114 countries. IndieGoGo honed their business model, website design and functionality and customer development while a resident of the Lester Center’s Berkeley Entrepreneurship Laboratory.
- Jerome Engel, Lester Center Faculty Director and David J. Teece, Thomas W. Tusher Professor in Global Business, co-hosted an academic conference in March 2010 in honor of the late Professor John Freeman, former Lester Center Faculty Director. The conference, supported by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, brought together leading faculty and PhD candidates with research focus in the areas of entrepreneurship and innovation. Speakers included Professor Jennifer Chatman, former Haas Professors Glenn Carroll and Charles O’Reilly, as well as preeminent faculty from around the world. (more)
- In March 2010, Jerome Engel, Lester Center Faculty Director, accepted the 2010 Olympus Lifetime of Educational Innovation Award for his leadership in entrepreneurship education for nearly 20 years. Engel was honored for not only founding and building one of the leading programs in entrepreneurship education in the world and U.C. Berkley, but promulgating his innovative approaches to universities all around the world through the Global Entrepreneurship Education Leadership Program which, through the support of Intel Corporation, has provided training and inspiration to over 800 faculty and 24 countries over the past four years.
- In March, the Lester Center and the Haas School of Business hosted the Velocity Conference - a program founded and organized by the Johnson Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation at Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business with the purpose of “Accelerating Entrepreneurial Careers.” This year, Haas hosted close to 50 students, staff and faculty from the Kelley School’s Entrepreneurship Management Academy and Rice University. The participants in the three-day program, including a few MBAs from Haas, heard from executives at Dreyer’s Ice Cream and Sun Microsystems, took a tour of Google and Plug and Play Tech Center and celebrated their visit to Berkeley and Silicon Valley with a closing night gala at the historic Berkeley City Club.
- Archived News.
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