Berkeley Invited by Australia and New Zealand to Advance Innovation and Entrepreneurship

Sutardja Center Chief Scientist Ikhlaq Sidhu was invited to keynote the national Growing Entrepreneurs Summit in New Zealand where he met with members of government and academia to discuss lessons learned at Berkeley on how to accelerate research-based innovation and how to teach entrepreneurship.

As part of the sequence of workshop events, Prof. Sidhu also made a guest appearance on national TV in New Zealand on the cable morning show called Breakfast, speaking on whether entrepreneurs are born or made and explained Berkeley’s approach to developing entrepreneurs.

Sidhu visited New Zealand to deliver a keynote address and lead a workshop on the Growing Entrepreneurs Summit sponsored by Steven Joyce, Minister of Tertiary Education, Skills and Employment. The aim of the summit was to discuss strategies for supporting entrepreneurship education in the country’s university system.

“It’s often debated whether entrepreneurialism can be taught, or whether entrepreneurs are born. I believed the latter until I met Professor Sidhu in the United States earlier this year.” said Minister Joyce, “He teaches ‘The Berkeley Method’ where students can be taught the mind-set of becoming an entrepreneur.”

The second phase of the trip was at the University of Melbourne in Australia.  Hosted by School of Engineering and as part of the Carlton Connect Initiative, Prof. Sidhu delivered a workshop on “Accelerating Innovation at Universities and Partnering with Industry.”  The workshop addressed how researchers can adapt their research process to make a larger impact in their work, where research ideas come from, where new venture ideas come from, how these are related, how having an open and industry connected research culture impacts results, and other elements of the Berkeley Method of Entrepreneurship.

“Personally, I am big fan of the Berkeley Method of Entrepreneurship as it puts the focus of the entrepreneurial journey, emphasizing the people side of the journey through appropriate emphasis on mindset development.” said Thas Nirmalathas, Professor of Electrical and Electronic Engineering at the University of Melbourne and Director of the Melbourne Networked Society Institute.

For more information on Sidhu’s trip down under, you can visit his LinkedIn post here.