Speaker > Biography

Raphael (Raffi) Amit

Robert B. Goergen Professor of Entrepreneurship;
Professor of Management
Academic Director, The Goergen Entrepreneurial Management Programs;
Academic Director, The Wharton Global Family Alliance
The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania

Raffi Amit is the Robert B. Goergen Professor of Entrepreneurship and a Professor of Management at the Wharton School. Dr. Amit is the Academic Director of the Goergen Entrepreneurial Management Programs which encompasses all of Wharton’s entrepreneurial programs. As well, he co-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.

Prior to joining the Wharton Faculty, Dr. Amit has been the Peter Wall Distinguished Professor at the Faculty of Commerce and Business Administration, University of British Columbia (UBC), where he was the founding director of the W. Maurice Young Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital Research Center. Between 1983 and 1990, Dr. Amit served on the faculty of the J.L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University, where he received the J.L. Kellogg Research Professorship and the Richard M. Paget Research Chair in Business Policy.

Dr. Amit holds B.A. and M.A. degrees in Economics, and received his Ph.D. in Managerial Economics and Decision Sciences from Northwestern University’s J.L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management.

Dr. Amit serves on the editorial boards of the Strategic Management Journal, Wharton Publishing and the European Management Review. He has completed a three-year term as an Associate Editor of Management Science, a 9 year term on the Editorial Board of Organizational Science and a 12 year term on the Editorial Board of the Journal of Business Venturing . His current research and teaching interests center on entrepreneurship in independent and corporate settings, business models and business strategy, performance implications of family owned, controlled, or managed firms, and on venture capital and private equity investments. Among the journals that have published his extensive academic research are the Academy of Management Journal, California Management Review, the Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, the Journal of Financial Economics, the Journal of Business Venturing, the Journal of Economics and Management Strategy, the Journal of Management, Management Science, Operations Research, the Strategic Management Journal, the European Journal of Management, and arange of trade publications.

Professor Amit has extensive industry and consulting experience. He has held a range of management and Board of Directors positions in entrepreneurial settings and participated in the formation and growth of numerous companies. He served as Chair of the Board of Directors of Creo Products Inc., (NASDAQ symbol CREO until May 2005 when it was acquired by Kodak.), between January 1996 and February 2001. Creo is a global high technology firm, with unique imaging technology, that is the world’s leading supplier of computer to plate imaging equipment for the printing industry. Dr. Amit served on both the Audit and Compensation Committees of Creo. Dr. Amit has been an active early stage Venture Capital investor, and has also consulted to private and public sector organizations in North America and Europe on a broad range of strategic issues, and on entrepreneurial management and new venture formation issues. Professor Amit has helped form the Korean Global IT Fund, a $100 million VC fund with offices in Palo Alto and Seoul and has served as the first Chairman of the KGIF Advisory Board. He now serves on the Board of Directors of Alvarion Inc. (NASDAQ:ALVR), a leading wireless communication equipment company. Dr. Amit is a member of the Compensation, Nominating and Governance Committee of Alvarion. He also serves on the Audit Committee, where he is the designated financial expert. As well, Dr. Amit provides advice to management on a range of strategic issues.

Dr. Amit has extensive experience in executive education having taught a range of courses in North America, Europe, Asia, and in Australia.