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Silicon Valley has long been considered the birthplace for technology start-ups, but that designation is coming under an intense challenge from the Boston area, home to hundreds of emerging tech companies and thousands of entrepreneurs and investors. In fact, for years, Boston has topped the list for most venture capital invested per capita in the US.
Now, a new publication has sprung up to help keep track of the start-up scene, and tapped Carroll School of Management Associate Professor John Gallaugher as one of its resources. Gallaugher, a member of the Carroll School Information Systems faculty, joins a select list of academic experts in the Boston Tech Guide, designed to be the technology community’s “front door” in finding educational, business development or career opportunities.
“It’s a huge honor, but I feel a little like Wayne and Garth in the old ‘Saturday Night Live’ skit: ‘I’m not worthy,’” says Gallaugher, referring to “Wayne’s World.” “Among those included are Joi Ito, who runs the MIT Media Lab – perhaps the nation’s leading grad tech innovation program – and Harvard Business School’s Clayton Christensen, whose writings on disruptive innovation may be the most influential management research in tech circles today.”
But it’s hardly surprising Boston Tech Guide would want to include Gallaugher, who has helped the Carroll School become a breeding ground for entrepreneurs. He leads the school’s annual TechTrek to Silicon Valley, San Francisco, Seattle, New York City, and Ghana. He also oversees the Venture Launch and Tech for Good speaker series programs and helps run the annual BC Venture Competition. Four companies with BC roots (Jebbit, NBD Nano, Wymsee and Drizly) have started up in just the past couple of years and all have gone on to raise millions of dollars in funding capital. BC’s success is clearly being noticed.
“At BC, we’ve been leading in engaging the Greater Boston tech and entrepreneurship community, and we’ve had tremendous success with our student innovators,” says Gallaugher. “The TechTrek Boston program brings students to visit venture capitalists, startup accelerators, entrepreneurs and area tech firms. Venture Launch and Tech for Good bring area innovators to campus in programs that really act like ‘learning steroids’ and accelerate student opportunity through talks, workshops, and practitioner office hours.
“These programs are a special, geography-derived competitive advantage that rivals can’t replicate, although they have wonderful faculty and bright students. Their programs don’t have the industrial base we have in Boston, so we lean hard on that asset to create something special for Eagles.”