Who is Bill?

As an Educator, in 2021, he was awarded by the United States Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (USASBE) as the Entrepreneurship Educator of the Year. In 2019, the Deshpande Foundation recognized him for Outstanding Contributions to Advancing Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Higher Education. In the past few years, he has also been recognized by multiple organizations for his leadership in the field such as the Boston Globe, Poets & Quants (Favorite Professor), and MIT itself.

While broadly responsible for overseeing practical entrepreneurship education at MIT, he has also directly designed, created, and taught over 10 courses at MIT ranging from introductory to advanced courses.  In addition, he likewise created a suite of co-curricular programs such as the MIT Climate and Energy Prize, MIT delta v summer accelerator, MIT Fuse micro-accelerator, and the t=0 festival of entrepreneurship

Beyond MIT, his five free online courses on MITx/edX, have been taken by hundreds of thousands of students in over 199 countries. His materials are today used by hundreds of schools and other organizations globally and have positively influenced millions of entrepreneurs.

Before joining MIT, Bill had a 25-year track record of business success. He has directly raised more than $100 million in funding for his companies and led the creation of hundreds of millions of dollars in market value in those companies. He worked at IBM for 11 years, from 1981 to 1993, and was featured in the movie Silicon Cowboys, for his work on the IBM Personal Computer. From 1993 to 2005, he founded and led two companies (Cambridge Decision Dynamics and SensAble Technologies) and then led a third (Viisage) that were all MIT spinouts. They were increasingly successful and accumulated a long list of over 24 awards and recognition including a two-time Inc. Magazine 500 Fastest-Growing Private Company.

As an author, he has written two books (Disciplined Entrepreneurship: 24 Steps to a Successful Startup and Disciplined Entrepreneurship Workbook). The former has been translated into over two dozen languages and became an award-winning international bestseller.

To stay current in a rapidly changing world, Bill also continues to sit on public and private boards as well as look for other opportunities to broaden his perspective. These have included keynote talks and workshops globally as well as visiting professorships at places like Strathclyde University, Duke University, and University of North Carolina.

Bill lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with his wife of over 40 years and they have four grown sons and two grandchildren. He is a former professional basketball player in England and recently won a gold medal in the sport at the 2023 U.S. National Senior Games.

Bill holds a bachelor’s in engineering from Harvard University and a master’s degree from the MIT Sloan School of Management.