Robert M. Metcalfe, PhD, an icon of entrepreneurial engineering and inventor of the local-area-networking (LAN) standard, Ethernet, has been hired to lead innovation initiatives at The University of Texas at Austin Cockrell School of Engineering. Metcalfe will be professor of innovation, fellow of the Clint W. Murchison, Sr. chair of free enterprise, and professor of electrical and computer engineering. His appointment begins in January 2011. “The addition of Bob Metcalfe to our leadership team significantly advances our commitment to innovation and bringing entrepreneurial engineering education to our students,” says Gregory L. Fenves, PhD, dean of the Cockrell School of Engineering. “In addition to working with students, Dr. Metcalfe will be fostering more dynamic interaction among faculty, research associates and graduate students, and venture capitalists, industrial partners and early adopters of technology.”

Metcalfe has served as a partner of Polaris Venture Partners since 2001 and will continue to advise the Massachusetts-based firm as a venture partner. During the 1990s, he was publisher of InfoWorld. Earlier, Metcalfe founded IPOed and grew the computer networking company 3Com Corp., which merged with Hewlett-Packard in 2010. Metcalfe began his career in the computer science laboratory of the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center, where he invented Ethernet.

“Innovation makes the world go round,” Metcalfe observes. “It brings prosperity and freedom. I look forward to helping bring even more innovative thinking into the classrooms and laboratories of The University of Texas at Austin. What’s more, I look forward to getting the fruits of that innovative thinking out into world markets where it can do some serious good.”

Source: The University of Texas at Austin

Posted November 17th, 2010 under Tech Transfer

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