Note: This course description is from a previous semester. The updated course description will be added when it becomes available.

COURSE NUMBER: MBA 290T.7

This course is cross-listed with the College of Engineering and the School of Information

COURSE TITLE: Energy, Sustainability and Business Innovation

UNITS OF CREDIT: 2 units

INSTRUCTORS: Andrew Isaacs and Christine Rosen

E-MAIL ADDRESS: isaacs@haas.berkeley.edu, crosen@haas.berkeley.edu

CLASS WEB PAGE LOCATION  http://catalyst.haas.berkeley.edu

MEETING DAY(S)/TIME: Tuesday 4:00 - 6:00PM

PREREQUISITE(S): none

CLASS FORMAT Lectures, cases, and extensive readings

BASIS FOR FINAL GRADE Paper and class participation

ABSTRACT OF COURSE'S CONTENT AND OBJECTIVES:

This course is for students who are interested in developing and commercializing innovative energy technologies that can help move society toward greater sustainability with respect to environmental impact and energy independence.  Currently, a wide range of technological, environmental, geopolitical, geological, regulatory, economic, and consumer demand factors are creating new opportunities for energy technologies.  The course will prepare students to:

- assess commercial viability of new technologies
- identify funding for projects
- position and market new energy solutions
- identify business strategies
- develop productive relationships with partners in industry, the environmental movement, and local, federal, and international agencies.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES:

Christine Rosen:  Professor Chris Rosen is an historian whose research focuses on the history, present challenges, and future trajectories of industrial society’s impact on and engagement with the natural environment.  She is currently writing a book on the history of the American response to industrial pollution between 1840 and 1930. It will show how many of the cultural, economic, political, and technological challenges we face as a society today as we try to come to terms with problems like global climate change and hormone disrupting and other toxic chemicals were prefigured in past struggles over the smokes, smells, and water pollution of 19^th and early 20^th century businesses.  Her most recent publications in this field include “'Knowing' Industrial Pollution: Nuisance Law and the Power of Tradition in a Time of Rapid Economic Change, 1840-1865,” Environmental History (October 2003), 563- 595, “Industrial Ecology and the Transformation of Corporate Environmental Management: A Business Historian’s Perspective,” in Arthur Molella and Joyce Bedi (eds.), Inventing for the Environment, (Cambridge: MIT Press in association with the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C., 2003), 318-338.  She also has an article forthcoming in Enterprise and Society, "The Role  of Pollution Regulation and Litigation in the Development of the Meat Packing Industry 1865 – 1880."

In addition to her historical work, Rosen does research on current developments and challenges in environmental policy and management.  She recently testified at a hearing before the California Senate Environmental Quality Committee chaired by State Senator Joseph Simitian on the need for a well designed green chemistry and green chemicals policy for California.  She has collaborated with Professor Sara Beckman and Janet Bercovitz (at Duke) on research on environmental supply chain management in the computer industry.  Their publications include “The Role of Voluntary Industry Standards in Environmental Supply-Chain Management: An Institutional Economics Perspective,” Journal of Industrial Ecology, 6 (Summer-Fall 2002), 103-124 and "Environmental Supply Chain Management in the Computer Industry: A Transactions Cost Economics Perspective," Journal of Industrial Ecology 4 (Fall, 2000) 83-103, and "Environmentally Sound Supply Chain Management: Implementation in the Computer Industry," in Christian Madu (ed.), Handbook of Environmentally Conscious Manufacturing, (Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2001). She also published “Product Recovery With Some Byte:  An Overview of Management Challenges and Environmental Consequences in Reverse Manufacturing for the US Computer Industry,” (with Charles D. White, Eric Masanet, and Sara L. Beckman), Journal of Cleaner Production, 11 (June 2003), 445 – 458 and “Environmental Strategy and Competitive Advantage: An Introduction,” California Management Review (Spring 2001), 8-15.  Professor Rosen created and taught the MBA elective on Corporate Environmental Strategy and Management for many years. 

Andrew Isaacs:  Andrew Isaacs is Adjunct Professor and Executive Director of UC Berkeley's Management of Technology Program, a joint program of Berkeley's Haas School of Business, College of Engineering, and School of Information.

Management of Technology is a graduate-level program offering 50 courses in management and high technology plus a wide range of programs that bring high tech companies to UC Berkeley.  Since its founding in 1987, the program has grown to be the largest inter-disciplinary program on the Berkeley campus, with approximately 1,500 graduate student enrollments annually.  Berkeley's Management of Technology Program is by far the largest of its type in the US.

Isaacs’ graduate courses at Berkeley include:

·  Introduction to Management of Technology
·  Marketing for High Tech Entrepreneurs
·  Opportunity Recognition:  Technology and Entrepreneurship in Silicon Valley

·  Energy, Sustainability and Business Innovation
·  Technology in the Developing World

Isaacs’ prior experience includes:

·  President, California Technology International, Inc., a consulting firm he founded in 1990, ranked among the Top 10 fastest growing companies in Silicon Valley in 1994 and 1995.
·  Senior executive at public and private companies in Silicon Valley.
·  Senior Scientist, NASA Johnson Space Center, Houston, TX.