The Venture Edge

Yesterday the University of Michigan announced that alumnus J. Robert Beyster and his wife Betty donated $15 million to the school's College of Engineering. Specifically, $9 million will be dedicated to endowing a fellowship program designed to fund up to 10 engineering doctoral students each year, $5 million will go towards the renovation of the Ford Nuclear Reactor Building on the University of Michigan Campus, and $1 million will be allocated to the Center for Entrepreneurship and the development of a curriculum to teach students about employee ownership. After earning bachelor degrees in engineering physics and engineering math in 1945, he earned his master's and doctoral degrees in physics at U-M in 1947 and 1950, respectively. Dr. Beyster went on to found SAIC in 1969 -- an employee-owned company (now public, and on the NYSE) that today has annual revenues in the neighborhood of $11 billion.