Toronto – Ajay Agrawal, a professor of strategic management at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management and the founder of the Creative Destruction Lab (CDL), received an honorary degree from the University of Calgary at its Fall Convocation earlier this month. The honorary degree is the University of Calgary’s highest academic honour, bestowed upon individuals whose notable achievements and community service merit recognition.
In awarding the degree, the University of Calgary noted that Prof. Agrawal has transformed the Canadian entrepreneurial ecosystem, empowering students and aspiring business owners to pursue their dreams. In founding the CDL he revolutionized the way public and private sectors interact. The CDL enables investors, mentors and researchers to collaborate and build scalable companies, helping students to action their ideas.
Prof. Agrawal founded the CDL at the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management in 2012. The University of Calgary partnered with the University of Toronto to launch CDL-Rockies in 2017. CDL-Rockies has had a meaningful impact on economic development and diversification in Alberta over the past 5 years via the commercialization of technological innovation.
The CDL delivers an objectives-based program for massively scalable, seed-stage, science- and technology-based companies. Its nine-month program allows founders to learn from experienced entrepreneurs, increasing their likelihood of success. Since its founding, the CDL has expanded to sites at five Canadian and five international universities.
Prof. Agrawal holds the Geoffrey Taber Chair in Entrepreneurship and Innovation and is a professor of strategic management at the Rotman School. In addition, he is a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research in Cambridge, MA and Faculty Affiliate at the Vector Institute for Artificial Intelligence in Toronto.
In addition to founding the CDL, Prof. Agrawal is also a co-founder of Next Canada, a not-for-profit organization that delivers three programs, The Next 36, Next AI, and Next Founders, all designed to support the training and personal development of young entrepreneurs, many of whom are building companies predicated on machine intelligence.
He is co-founder and co-chair of two annual conferences on machine intelligence: “Machine Learning and the Market for Intelligence” [applied], and "The NBER Economics of Artificial Intelligence Conference" [scholarly].
Prof. Agrawal is a co-author of the best-selling book Prediction Machines: The Simple Economics of Artificial Intelligence, published by Harvard Business Review Press with Rotman Profs. Avi Goldfarb and Joshua Gans. He is also co-author of a number of scholarly and popular press articles on the economics of machine intelligence. In 2017, The Globe and Mail named him to its “Power 50” list of the most influential Canadians in business.
Creative Destruction Lab (CDL) is a nonprofit organization that delivers an objectives-based program for massively scalable, seed-stage, science- and technology-based companies. Its nine-month program allows founders to learn from experienced entrepreneurs, increasing their likelihood of success. Founded in 2012 by Professor Ajay Agrawal at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management, the program has expanded to ten sites across four countries: Oxford (Saïd Business School, University of Oxford), Paris (HEC Paris), Atlanta (Scheller College of Business, Georgia Institute of Technology), Madison (Wisconsin School of Business, University of Wisconsin-Madison), Seattle (University of Washington, Foster School of Business), Vancouver (Sauder School of Business, University of British Columbia), Montreal (HEC Montréal), Calgary (Haskayne School of Business, University of Calgary), and Halifax (Rowe School of Business, Dalhousie University).
It now includes 16 streams: AgTech, Artificial Intelligence, Blockchain, Climate, Commerce, Energy, FinTech, Health, Matter, Neuro, Oceans, Prime (General Technology), Quantum, Risk, Space, and Supply Chain. The successful commercialization of cutting-edge science and technology achieved through the program has led to the creation of over $15 billion in equity value. CDL alumni companies include North (Waterloo), Atomwise (San Francisco), Kyndi (Palo Alto), Xanadu (Toronto), BenchSci (Toronto), Kheiron Medical (London), and Roadbotics (Pittsburgh).
The Rotman School of Management is part of the University of Toronto, a global centre of research and teaching excellence at the heart of Canada’s commercial capital. Rotman is a catalyst for transformative learning, insights and public engagement, bringing together diverse views and initiatives around a defining purpose: to create value for business and society. For more information, visit
www.rotman.utoronto.ca
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For more information:
Ken McGuffin
Manager, Media Relations
Rotman School of Management
University of Toronto
Voice: 416.946.3818
E-mail: mcguffin@rotman.utoronto.ca
Amarpreet Kaur
Associate Director
Creative Destruction Lab
E-mail amarpreet.kaur@creativedestructionlab.com