Beedie faculty and alumni engage with Management of Technology sector leaders at PICMET 2012

Colleen Collins, Associate Dean at the Segal Graduate School at SFU’s Beedie School of Business, chaired one of the keynote sessions at PICMET 2012

Faculty and alumni of the Beedie School of Business engaged with industry and academia in the Technology Management sector at a major conference held in Vancouver recently.

PICMET is an annual conference, organized by the Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology, which brings together leading figures from innovation management in a high-impact symposium in order to set the stage for the sector in years to come. The Beedie School of Business was a sponsor of this year’s conference, which was held at the Sheraton Wall Centre Hotel in downtown Vancouver from 29 July – 2 August.

Leading experts from academic institutions, industrial corporations and government agencies attended PICMET 2012, which was attended by over 400 delegates and focused on the role of Technology Management for Emerging Technologies.

The Beedie School of Business, as well as being a supporter of the event, was well represented by faculty, graduate students and alumni who presented their research to delegates from as far afield as Japan, Columbia and South Africa at a number of sessions over the course of the conference.

Dr. Koroush Malek, National Research Council of Canada, was one of several Beedie alumni to present at the conference, with his typology, created during the capstone project of his MOT MBA, entitled “Assessing Materials Innovation with Technical-economic Cost Models”. Other alumni and SFU student presenters included MOT MBA alumna Dr. Nancy dos Santos, MBA alumnus Lee O’Donnell and MOT MBA alumna Vivien Lo, who presented their commercialization research on the biotech, hydrogen and solar cell sectors, respectively.

“PICMET is the leading conference in Technology Management, and for the Beedie School of Business to be so well represented is testament to the quality of education and technology management research on offer here,” says Dr. Elicia Maine, Academic Chair, Management of Technology MBA program at the Beedie School of Business. “The conference was also an ideal opportunity for interdisciplinary research between business and engineering. This was demonstrated by one of our graduates, Ali Taleb, presenting his research on the Commercialization of fuel cells, jointly supervised between faculty at the Beedie School of Business and Mechatronics Engineering.”

The Beedie School of Business also hosted a workshop for visiting delegates from Korea University. Professors from the Management of Technology MBA program presented their research on Technology Strategy, Innovation, Marketing, and Technology Portfolio Management to students and faculty from Korea University’s recently launched Management of Technology graduate program.