Asper’s Annual Lecture Series enables Asper Center students and faculty the opportunity to hear first-hand from academic and business leaders in the fields of business and entrepreneurship.
Annual Lecture 2020/21
Why are entrepreneurs failing us in times of need?
Prof. Tarun Khanna from the Harvard Business School
Speaker: Prof. Tarun Khanna is the Jorge Paulo Lemann Professor at the Harvard Business School.
Annual Lecture 2019/20
Entrepreneurship in times of crisis
Prof. Josh Lerner from the Harvard Business School
Speaker: Prof. Lerner is the Head of the Entrepreneurial Management Unit and the Jacob H. Schiff Professor of Investment Banking at Harvard Business School.
Annual Lecture 2017
Entrepreneurship Policy: A Hopeless Cause?
Speaker: Prof. Thomas Hellmann, Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Saïd Business School, University of Oxford
Over the last decade entrepreneurship has become a global fascination. Policy makers from around the world look towards entrepreneurs for achieving economic growth, with Silicon Valley envy being a common occurrence. However, formulating effective policies for promoting entrepreneurship has turned out to be exceptionally difficult, and economists are lagging behind in terms of providing constructive guidance. In this talk, Prof. Thomas Hellmann discusses some of his own recent theory and empirical work, as well as the bigger challenges of designing and implementing entrepreneurship policies: is it a hopeless cause, or not?
Annual Lecture 2016
Back to the Future? The Changing Locus of Innovation in America
Speaker: Prof. Ashish Arora, Duke University (publications)
Annual Lecture 2015
Markets for technology: why do we see them?, why don't we see more of them?, and why should we care?
The annual Asper Center Lecture for 2015 was delivered by Prof. Alfonso Gambardella on December 17th at The Hebrew University. Prof. Gambardella's lecture, Markets for technology: why do we see them?, why don't we see more of them?, and why should we care?, dealt with the factors affecting the proliferation of technological markers at the end of the 19th century, their decrease in the 20th century and their revival as of the 1990s . Prof. Gambardella's lecture can be viewed here.
Alfonso Gambardella is a Professor of Corporate Management at Bocconi University, Milan, obtained his PhD in 1991 from Stanford University, Department of Economics. His research focuses on technology strategy. Along with publications in leading international journals, his book, Markets for Technology (with Ashish Arora e Andrea Fosfuri, MIT Press) is widely cited. He is Co-Editor of Strategic Management Journal. He participated in numerous research projects of the European Commission and other research agencies. His website is www.alfonsogambardella.it
Annual Lecture 2014
What do Private Equity Investors (Say) They Do?
The annual Asper Center Lecture for 2014 was delivered by Prof. Paul Gompers on December 11th to a packed Senate Hall at The Hebrew University. His riveting lecture, What do Private Equity Investors (Say) They Do?, dealt with the challenges faced by the private equity industry and the latest research on this topic. Prof. Gompers’ lecture can be viewed here.
Paul A. Gompers is the Eugene Holman Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School. His research focuses on the structure, governance, and performance of private equity funds; sources of financing, incentive design, and performance of private firms; and long-run performance evaluation for newly public companies. Prof. Gompers’ work on private equity funds has examined the relationship between general partners and their portfolio companies. He has also investigated factors affecting the structure, timing, and monitoring activities by the general partner and how these factors affect the success or failure of entrepreneurial firms. Similarly, Prof. Gompers has examined the relationship between institutional investors and private equity fund managers. He is a Faculty Research Fellow in the National Bureau of Economic Research's Corporate Finance Program. Read more about Prof. Gompers here.
Annual Lecture 2013
Keeping it in the Family: Financing Growth Without Losing Control
Professors Rafi Amit and Morten Bennedsen gave the 2013 Annual Asper Center Lecture on December 19th to hundreds of eager listeners at The Hebrew University. The inspiring lectures presented their research on entrepreneurial family firms and the event was titled: Keeping it in the Family: Financing Growth Without Losing Control. The lectures can be viewed here.
Dr. Raphael (“Raffi”) Amit is the Robert B. Goergen Professor of Entrepreneurship and a Professor of Management at the Wharton School. Dr. Amit founded and leads the Wharton Global Family Alliance (WGFA), a unique academic-family business partnership established to enhance the marketplace advantage and the social wealth creation contributions of global families through thought leadership, knowledge transfer, and the sharing of ideas and best practices among influential global families. He also serves as the Academic Director of the Wharton Entrepreneurship, which encompasses all of Wharton’s entrepreneurial programs. Read more about Professor Amit here.
Dr. Morten Bennedsen is the André and Rosalie Hoffmann Chaired Professor of Family Enterprise at INSEAD. Dr. Bennedsen’s specializes in family business governance, corporate governance, applied microeconomics, and firm theory. Read more about Professor Bennedson here.