Phil Phan, the Warren H. Bruggeman ’46 and Pauline Urban Bruggeman Distinguished Professor of Management at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Troy, N.Y. — Phil Phan, the Warren H. Bruggeman ’46 and Pauline Urban Bruggeman Distinguished Professor of Management at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s Lally School, has been awarded the Bosch Berlin Prize in Public Policy. Phan will join more than 20 distinguished American scholars involved in cultural, academic, and public affairs who have been selected to study at the American Academy in Berlin.

Phan is an expert in the areas of corporate governance, strategy, technological entrepreneurship, and regional economic development. His research at the American Academy will focus on creating a model for large corporations to more successfully engage in technology transfer and joint innovation when they ally with small, entrepreneurial firms.

“Professor Phan is an outstanding leader with an expansive vision focused on the study, research, and exchange of ideas regarding the critical challenges in the fields of corporate governance, industry structure, and enterprise creation,” said David Gautschi, dean of the Lally School. “He is keenly interested in developments in these areas around the world. We are proud to celebrate the honor that the Bosch Berlin Prize confers upon him, and the contributions he will make to the community of scholars in Germany.”

Phan hopes to create a complete model of technology transfer success in commercial settings that would help managers of large corporations better understand the pitfalls and keys for success. As part of the research, he will compare technology transfer from research universities to commercial enterprises with those between entrepreneurial start-ups and large corporations. Phan also will examine how limited resources – related to talent and finances –  have changed the way companies engage in research and development (R&D), and develop a series of case studies featuring companies in Germany. He will present his research findings in a lecture at the Hans Arnhold Center, the Academy’s residence for fellows.

“The appointment is a great honor for me,” said Phan. “In receiving this fellowship, I will have an opportunity to serve not only as an exchange representative of the United States to Germany, in keeping with the spirit and intent of the American Academy, but also to extend my research to Europe, an important political and economic partner of the U.S.”  

The American Academy in Berlin is a private, nonprofit center for advanced study. Its stated mission is to establish intellectual and professional ties between Germans and Americans in the arts, in the humanities, and in public affairs. The Academy hosts emerging and established Americans engaged in artistic endeavors, scholarship in history, philosophy, and literary criticism, and in the formulation of public policy. Each year, the Berlin Prize Fellowships program brings leading American scholars and professionals to Berlin.

The American Academy in Berlin is currently chaired by the Honorable Richard Holbrooke, former Assistant Secretary of State and former U.S. Ambassador to Germany. The Fall 2006 Berlin Prize fellows include: Washington Post writer and editor Ann Applebaum, composer Stephen Hartke, Stanford Law professor Lawrence Lessig, novelist Susanna Moore, archaeologist Charles Brian Rose of the University of Pennsylvania, Sheila Weiss of Clarkson University’s history department, classics professor Dimitrios Yatromanolakis of Johns Hopkins University, anthropologist Esra Ozyurek of the University of California, San Diego, and Jonathan Tucker, a senior research fellow at the Monterey Institute of International Studies, among others.

Phan’s current research includes: the influences of economic and technological policy, family member employment, entrepreneurship and university-based technology transfer, and more. He has published more than 65 peer-reviewed papers and conference proceedings, and his research has appeared in leading national and international research journals. He is a frequent speaker, and has given more than 70 presentations throughout the world.

Phan earned a Bachelor’s of Business Administration with Distinction in hospitality management from the University of Hawaii at Manoa in 1984. He completed his Ph.D. in Strategic Management and Industrial Organization Economics at the University of Washington in 1992. Phan joined Rensselaer in 2000.

Phan begins the four-month fellowship at the American Academy in Berlin in September.

About Rensselaer’s Lally School
Rensselaer’s Lally School of Management and Technology was founded in 1963 as an integral part of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, the nation’s oldest degree-granting technological university. Building on Rensselaer’s heritage of more than 175 years of leadership in science and engineering, the Lally School is dedicated to advancing business through innovation. The Lally School’s curriculum is designed to produce leaders who combine creative passion with the ability to integrate technology across business functions. The faculty emphasizes the value of hands-on experience available through campus resources such as the Severino Center for Technological Entrepreneurship and the nation’s first on-campus business incubator. Rensselaer’s Lally School offers graduate and undergraduate degree programs in management, doctoral programs in management and technology, an Executive MBA program, and a joint Sino-U.S. MBA for companies operating in China. For more information on the Lally School, go to www.lallyschool.rpi.edu.

To learn more about the American Academy in Berlin 2006-2007 fellows, visit http://www.americanacademy.de/index.php?id=338

Contact: Jessica Otitigbe
Phone: (518) 276-6050
E-mail: otitij@rpi.edu