Moses, Joel

English

Engineering Conferences International

ProceedingsTeaching Entrepreneurship to EngineeringStudentsEngineering Conferences International Year 2003Creating an Entrepreneurial Culture atMITJoel MosesMassachusetts Institute of TechnologyThis paper is posted at ECI Digital Archives.http://dc.engconfintl.org/teaching/10Creating an EntrepreneurialCulture at MITJoel MosesInstitute ProfessorFormer Provost and DeanEngineering, MITSome MIT Numbers• Number of faculty, about 950, about 350 inengineering• Number of undergraduates, about 4500, 2/3 willgraduate in engineering, about 1/3 in EECS• Number of graduates, about 5500, about 2200 inengineering• Sponsored research about $450M, about $180M inengineering• Total budget about $1.4B, $400M at Lincoln Lab.Creating an EntrepreneurialCulture• MIT faculty, staff and students have foundedcompanies for over a hundred years (e.g., CampbellSoup in the 190th century)• One could say that the entrepreneurial culture is inthe walls of MIT– Role Models– Shared history/experiences– Creating Momentum– Creating a Culture of Trust– Creating ProcessesCommon Experiences/History• Radiation Laboratory developed radar duringWWII-outgrowth was Lincoln Lab, RLE and EEversion of engineering science• RLE under Wiesner was broadly about electronicsand communication - Modern linguistics (Chomsky)arose out of RLE. Bose rose out of RLE• Entrepreneurial faculty are respected, if theyremain full-time faculty membersCreating a Culture of Trust• National Research Council 1995 review ofgraduate programs - MIT in top three in thenation in 17 of 22 programs rated– Relatively uniform excellence leads to trust amongfaculty - interdisciplinary research flourishes• Trust leds to flexibility - can do many thingswithout getting (too much) prior approvalCreating Momentum• Route 128 was initially intended to be a fast way tocircumnavigate Boston• MITs Radiation Lab led to MIT’s Lincoln Lab (1951)nearRte 128. It led to DEC (1958) and other electronics andcomputer firms• Venture capitalists learned their trade by investing in suchfirms (and teaching at HBS)• Engineers moved into the area• BankBoston study, ca. 1995, claims that the 4000 firms thatwere founded over the years by MIT students, faculty andstaff had a $232B annual volumeCreating Processes• Intellectual property - EG&G started out on MIT space in 1930s -we had no patent of IP policy then; by the 1980s we were patentingmore than any other university, but we learned how o license MITIP from Stanford in 1985. In FY02 there were 132 patents, 112licenses and 24 direct start-ups (total number of start-ups is notknown)• Money for MIT’s bottom line is not the issue. Rather it is thedesire to help faculty, staff and students get their ideas into thecommercial world.• Conflict of Interest Policy - Quire strict, an annual report todepartment heads regarding time spent on Outside ProfessionalActivities and relationships of MIT people in one’s firmsRelationships betweenEngineering and Sloan• MIT’s School of Engineering has no IndustrialEngineering Department - IE is usually done inthe Sloan School of Management (and Sloanmakes sure of that)• Relationship between the schools have beenquite good in the past 15 years - led to Leadersfor Manufacturing program, Systems Designand Management program, and Sloan supportfor education in entrepreneurshipMore Recent Events• ME Design Contest (2.70 - largely taken bysophomores) - finals were broadcast on PBS forseveral years - 800 students show up to cheer thecontestants twice a year• $50k competition - Business plan written by teamsof students from Engineering and Sloan - Evaluatedby entrepreneurs- Akami proposal came in 2d placeabout four years ago - competition copied in Europe(£50k)Industry Relationships• Industry partnerships ($3M or more per firmper year) account for about  5% of all on-campus research - Total industry support ofresearch is nearly 20% (FY02)• Overall industry support at MIT in research,cash gifts, fellowships and equipment isover $150M per yearCambridge - MIT Institute• Outgrowth of MIT Partnership with Ford. Formerchairman of Ford suggested to Tony Blair to make adeal with MIT in order to foster climate ofentrepreneurship in Britain. Deal is worth more than$100M over 5 years.• 50 Cambridge students study at MIT each year, 50MIT students sudy t Cambridge University.Currently the former do better than the latter.• Joint research between MIT and a consortium ofBritish universities (mainly Cambridge).Examples of Education inEntrepreneurship• Entrepreneurship Center (Ken Morse) - Bringsentrepreneurs together, teaches graduate levelsubjects in Sloan School• TEEMS - Technical Entrepreneurship forEngineers and Management - proposal forundergraduate education program based inSloan, 30 students from Engineering and Sloan- business plans, personality traits, etc. - to betaught during January intersession

Creating an Entrepreneurial Culture at MIT

https://dc.engconfintl.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1009&amp;context=teaching

Creating an Entrepreneurial Culture at MIT

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Engineering Conferences International