Rice Alliance recognized as one of ‘world’s best entrepreneurship centers’

BY MARY LYNN FERNAU
Special to the Rice News

The world’s best entrepreneurship centers were recognized in six areas for their outstanding contributions to entrepreneurship teaching and outreach last month at the annual Global Consortium of Entrepreneurship Centers (GCEC) awards banquet. More than 340 university entrepreneurship educators and center directors attended the three-day GCEC conference hosted by Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship and Jones Graduate School of Business at Rice University.

”The best entrepreneurship centers in the world — from long-established centers, to new programs only months old — shared best practices and ideas for entrepreneurship education, innovation and technology commercialization, research, fundraising and outreach programs designed to help launch early stage companies,” said Brad Burke, managing director of the Rice Alliance. ”The best of these centers were recognized by their peers for their outstanding work. Their efforts have far-reaching effects as these are the people who are helping entrepreneurs who themselves are responsible for most of the job creation, economic development and wealth creation in our world.”

Awards were presented to the following university entrepreneurship centers:

• Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship, Rice University and MIT University
  Excellence in Specialty Entrepreneurship Education
• Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship, Rice University
  Outstanding Center of Entrepreneurial Leadership
• University of California Berkeley, Temple University, & University of Texas at Dallas
  Outstanding Contributions to Advance the Discipline of Entrepreneurship
• Georgia Institute of Technology University and University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill
  Exceptional Activities in Entrepreneurship Across Disciplines
• Indiana University – Bloomington
  Exceptional Contributions in Entrepreneurship Research
• University of Southern California – Marshall
  NASDAQ Center of Entrepreneurial Excellence
• Maggie Ailes, Ball State University & Travis J. Brown, Indiana University-Bloomington
  Entrepreneurial Support Award

The NASDAQ Center of Entrepreneurial Excellence award is determined by a set of 10 criteria that are used in aggregate by a judging panel to assess the worthiness of an award-winning center. Nominations must be made by a previous award winner. NASDAQ has been a sponsor of the GCEC since its inception 13 years ago and continues to support the organization, entrepreneurship and business development. Paulette Peoples, GlobeNewswire senior product specialist, presented the award on behalf of NASDAQ.

Additional awards were presented for best elevator pitch highlighting the finest aspects of each center. The competition challenged each center’s representative to demonstrate their prowess at one of the aspects they teach their students — how to sell a business in 90 seconds. This competition took a more lighthearted view, awarding large, blue, foam cowboy hats to the top 10 winners. Greg Price of GCEC sponsor PKF Texas and Burke presented the awards.

The GCEC is the premier global organization for university-based centers of entrepreneurship. It has become the primary vehicle by which top entrepreneurship centers work together to share information, best practices, develop programs and initiatives, and collaborate and assist each other in advancing, strengthening and celebrating the contributions and impact of university entrepreneurship programs.

Sponsors of the conference included the GOOSE Society, Microsoft BizSpark, NASDAQ OMX, Administaff, PKF Texas, UK Science and Innovation, British Consulate-General, Houston, NCIIA, Acton Foundation, Pearson, Plug and Play Tech Center, Fortune Small Business and BusinessMakers Radio Show.

The Rice Alliance’s mission is to provide entrepreneurship education and to support the commercialization of technology innovations and the creation of new companies in the Texas and Houston region. Since its inception in 1999, the Rice Alliance has assisted in the launch of more than 230 new technology companies, which have raised more than half-a-billion dollars in early stage funding. Of these, approximately 35 companies have been launched based on technology developed by Rice faculty and researchers and licensed from the Rice Office of Technology Transfer.

Unique among many entrepreneurship centers, the Rice Alliance was formed as a strategic alliance of three schools at Rice University: the George R. Brown School of Engineering, the Wiess School of Natural Sciences and the Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Business.

For more information about the Rice Alliance, visit www.alliance.rice.edu. For more information about the GCEC, visit http://www.globalentrepreneurshipconsortium.org/index.cfm.

— Mary Lynn Fernau is director of marketing for the Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship.