The Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders Seminar series begins on Wednesday, January 12, with Teach For America CEO Wendy Kopp. As the brainchild of Kopp while studying at Princeton, in 1989, Teach For America works for equity in American classrooms by recruiting some of the brightest college graduates to take on the duty of teaching. From its inception as a social entrepreneurship startup with a tiny budget, Teach for America is now an enterprise-size organization with net assets in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Her visit offers students the chance to hear from an entrepreneur who has traversed the successes and struggles of starting an organization and staying with it for the last 20 years.
View the entire ETL lineup for Winter 2011.
The ETL seminar is actually a course hosted by the Department of Management Science and Engineering at Stanford University. Stanford students can sign-up for MS&E 472 to earn one unit of credit for the course, but all members of the public are welcome to attend the seminars on Wednesdays, from 4:30-5:30 pm, in the Huang Engineering Center at Stanford University. Of course, for those fans of ETL who may not be able to make it to the campus, you can enjoy all of our speakers’ entrepreneurship insights, lessons, and stories by visiting ECorner. Visitors can access podcasts, full-length videos, and highlighted clips from each of our speakers.
Here are a few sample videos from last quarter’s series.
httpvp://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=E5A627AFFC183B96
For winter quarter the ETL Seminar presents visionaries and entrepreneurs from a number of cutting-edge sectors.
Mobile, Web, and Cloud Computing Technology
Aaron Levie (Jan 19), co-founder and CEO of Box.net, leads an organization seeking to let everyone have the freedom to share content, from anywhere, through the power of cloud computing. Beyond individual users and small businesses, Box.net has also shown the value of their platform to a growing number of enterprise customers.
Wenceslao Casares and Meyer Malka (Feb 9) are the founders and co-CEOs of Bling Nation, as well as founding partners of private investment firm, MECK, Ltd. Bling Nation’s mobile technology platform works to connect users’ online and offline customer experiences. Businesses can build loyalty programs, while consumers gain integration between smooth checkout experiences and their social media presences.
Clean-Technology
Can you use captured carbon-dioxide emissions to help develop sustainable building materials? Founder Brent Constantz (Jan 26) and his company, Calera, are doing just that. With Calera’s portfolio of technologies, the company is building a profitable model to create a new future for the environment. Constantz also serves as a consulting associate professor at Stanford.
As a successful serial entrepreneur and the founder of Idealab, Bill Gross (Feb 23) has a track record of bringing innovative technologies to market. As an incubator, Idealab focuses on technologies and products in the clean-tech, communications, Internet media, and automation categories. Gross also serves on the board of directors at eSolar, a solar power plant company, and the California Institute of Technology.
Biotechnology
Susan Desmond-Hellmann (Feb 2) is not only chancellor of UCSF and an oncologist and clinical researcher, but she also served as president of product development at Genentech for much of the past decade. She was also named one of the world’s seven most “powerful innovators” by Forbes magazine in 2009.
As president and CEO of medical device company OptiMedica, Mark Forchette (Feb 16) leads the organization in its mission to deliver leading-edge technologies for the treatment of ocular disease. Some of the company’s most valuable offerings for the treatment of retinal conditions were initially developed right here at Stanford.
Special ETL Seminar to Close E-Week 2011
Author Guy Kawasaki (Mar 2) rounds out the series for winter quarter, discussing his new book, Enchantment. Kawasaki is a legendary visionary, tech evangelist, and serial entrepreneur. Video clips from his previous visits to DFJ ETL are some of our most popular content. As an added bonus, The Valley Girl, Jesse Draper, will be holding a post-seminar interview with Kawasaki. Be sure not to miss this special seminar on March 2. We look forward to seeing you at ETL throughout the winter.
