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Southfield - Lawrence Tech adds engineering entrepreneur in residence

metromode, 10/1/2009

Bridging business and engineering isn't the easiest task, but it's one that Pavan Muzumdar plans on making easier at Lawrence Technological University.

The Southfield-based school just appointed Muzumdar as its first engineering entrepreneur in residence. The new position, funded by a $1.1 million grant from the Kern Family Foundation over five years, will focus on integrating an entrepreneurial mindset into the university's undergraduate engineering curriculum.

That will mean everything from modifying courses to incorporate more of a business focus to supporting the idea of tech transfer and commercialization of Lawrence Tech's research and ideas. He will also work with senior engineering students on product development projects.

"I will help these students look at these products from a business standpoint, such as defining a need, the size of the market, and at what price point it would sell," Muzumdar says.

Muzumdar has an extensive business background. In 1997, the University of Massachusetts alum left a consulting job in New York to work at Clawson-based MV Software, Inc., where he instituted a number of startup initiatives, such as developing a new software product from the ground up. The India native also helped establish a wholly owned subsidiary of the company in Mumbai, India.

He also served as the COO of JRE Tires, a wholesale and retail distributor of tires and wheels earlier this decade before leading the negotiations for the sale of the company in 2006. Last year he founded Pieris Capital in Bloomfield Hills, where he has worked on identifying opportunities for investors, providing advisory services, and raising capital for high-growth companies.

Source: Pavan Muzumdar, engineering entrepreneur in residence at Lawrence Technological University
Writer: Jon Zemke

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