Alvin J. Siteman (1948) Professor of Entrepreneurship at MIT, Faculty Director, Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship, Associate Dean for Innovation
Fiona Murray is the Alvin J. Siteman (1948) Professor of Entrepreneurship, an Associate Professor of Technological Innovation, Entrepreneurship, and Strategic Management, and the Faculty Director, Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship. She is also the Associate Dean for Innovation.
She is an international expert on the transformation of investments in scientific and technical innovation into innovation-based entrepreneurship that drives jobs, wealth creation, and regional prosperity. Murray has a special interest in how policies, programs, and relationships between academia and industry can be designed to accelerate the productive role of universities in their local entrepreneurial ecosystem. These include intellectual property issues as well as broader programs that enable technology transfer and commercialization.
A former scientist trained at Harvard University and the University of Oxford, Murray has taught and published extensively on fostering cultures that bridge scientific innovation and entrepreneurship, building effective entrepreneurial strategies for science-based businesses (in biotech and biomedical companies and recently, clean energy), and evaluating the commercial potential of novel scientific ideas. Closely tied to real world problems, Fiona works with science-based startups on their commercialization strategy as well as a range of firms designing global organizations that are both commercially successful and at the forefront of science. These firms seek to leverage the ideas of a wide range of internal scientists, external innovators accessed through traditional research contracts, as well as “Open Innovation” mechanisms including innovation prizes. Her recent engagements have focused on relationships that span the public and private sectors. She is particularly interested in new emerging organizational arrangements for the effective commercialization of science, including public-private partnerships, not-for-profits, venture philanthropy, and university-initiated seed funding and innovation-focused competitions and prizes.
Murray has served on the faculty at MIT Sloan since 1999. In 2006 she was promoted to Associate Professor in the Technological Innovation & Entrepreneurship Strategic Management Group. Previously, Murray held positions at Harvard University, the University of Oxford, the Asian Development Bank, and United Nations Environment Program in Kenya.
Murray received her BA ’89 and MA ‘90 from the University of Oxford in Chemistry. She subsequently moved to the United States and earned an AM ’92 and PhD ’96 from Harvard University in Applied Sciences.