of Note
Wyss Gift Sets Harvard Record
Engineer, entrepreneur, and philanthropist Hansjörg Wyss (MBA ’65) has made a gift of $125 million to Harvard University to create the Hansjörg Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering. It is the largest individual gift in Harvard’s history.
The institute will be a collaborative enterprise bringing together experimentalists, theoreticians, and clinicians with expertise in engineering, biology, chemistry, physics, mathematics, computer science, robotics, medicine, and surgery. They will work to develop biomimetic materials, microdevices, microbots, and innovative disease-reprogramming technologies, which will provide a deeper understanding of living systems and will lead to more efficient bio-inspired ways of creating a more sustainable world.
There’s a New Class in Town
Members of the MBA Class of 2010 (900 in all) reported for duty in September. Selected from a pool of 8,661 applicants, the group is 38 percent women and 33 percent international. Just over 200 of the incoming students have an industry background in consulting; venture capital and private equity follow, at 119 students. Educational backgrounds comprised three general categories: humanities (42 percent); engineering and natural sciences (32 percent); and business administration (23 percent), with the remaining 3 percent of students falling under “other.”
…and by Comparison
Last June, the MBA Class of 1958 celebrated its 50th Reunion. HBS professor emeritus Stephen A. Greyser, one of five class members who became professors at the School (likely a record for any class), notes that because the class graduated at the midpoint of HBS’s life, its numbers offer an interesting snapshot of a different era. For example, of the class’s 2,173 applicants, 36 percent were admitted; 70 percent were either veterans or on active duty and sent by the military. There were no women and few minorities. In a survey to which nearly half the class responded, 27 percent reported being fired, and 43 percent had quit a job.
Historic HBS Photos Online
To mark the School’s Centennial, archivists at the Baker Library | Bloomberg Center compiled significant collections of historical photographs. The Institutional Memory project’s more than 400 images can be accessed at: http://institutionalmemory.hbs.edu/photogallery.
The HBS Archives Photograph Collection’s several categories of photos, including Student Life, Faculty and Staff, Wartime Schools, and Alumni, can also be accessed at: via.harvard.edu.
And to view past and current exhibits from the Baker Library | Bloomberg Center, go to http://www.library.hbs.edu/hc/exhibits/.
Green Talk at HBS
Before an overflow audience in September, Scott Nyquist (MBA ’84) and Thomas Seitz of McKinsey gave a talk on the “The Future of Energy: How Geopolitics, Environmental, and Supply Risks Are Shaping the Industry.” Drawing on the consulting firm’s research on greenhouse gas emissions worldwide, Nyquist reported that such emissions could be cut by a third through greater efficiencies. He also noted, however, that meeting the lowered emission goals set for 2050 by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change will require a larger increase in productivity than occurred with the Industrial Revolution.
Students Win Energy Competition
In October, a team of five HBS students won the National Energy Finance Challenge at the University of Texas’s McCombs School of Business, the Harbus reported. Marwan Chaar, Puja Jain, Anh Pham-Vu, Ravi Sarin, and Christine Telyan (all HBS ’09) bested teams from fourteen other schools. Competitors were given 36 hours to analyze a case about how a mid-tier oil and gas company should respond to federal mandates requiring ethanol-blended gasoline. Each team presented its conclusions to, and was questioned by, a panel of executives from prominent energy and consulting firms.
