June 24, 2014
Rhoads leaving UW commercialization; Jandhyala takes new innovation post
Linden Rhoads, who as vice provost for commercialization has greatly boosted the number of patents and startup companies coming from the University of Washington each year, has announced plans to return to private industry.
During her six years, the UW Center for Commercialization has doubled the number of patents filed each year, and the number of startup companies set a record 17 last year and could reach 18 this year by the time of the center’s annual startup celebration on July 29.
Rhoads also has spearheaded greater engagement with the regional business and investor communities.
“She has created a great record of achievement at the UW,” said Provost Ana Mari Cauce. “She built a strong unit devoted to service and constant improvement.”
Rhoads will remain as executive director for commercialization the rest of 2014 and will continue to be involved with the UW’s commercialization efforts in the future.
On July 1, Vikram Jandhyala, a UW professor of electrical engineering and an inaugural Center for Commercialization entrepreneurial faculty fellow, will take over the new position of vice provost for innovation.
Jandhyala worked in the electronic design software industry before joining the UW faculty in 2000. He chaired electrical engineering from 2011 until earlier this year. He holds degrees from the Indian Institute of Technology in Delhi and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Working with his students, he founded Physware (now Nimbic Inc.) in 2006, a venture-backed cloud-based simulation software company that was acquired by Mentor Graphics this year. His current interests are social and organizational networks, computational science and big data, electronic design automation, technology entrepreneurship and educational innovation.
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Tag(s): Center for Commercialization
