Hanover
Tillman Gerngross, a professor at Dartmouth’s Thayer School of Engineering, who was named an associate provost of the Office of Entrepreneurship & Technology Transfer in 2013, will relinquish his provost duties on June 30. Trip Davis, who was named executive director of OETT at the same time, will be joining Fresh Air Sensor, a Dartmouth-affiliated startup, as a partner and executive.
Both administrators said the changes are the result of their jobs being completed and the desire to step away from academic administration to focus on active business endeavors.
Gerngross said that when he assumed the newly created provost post three years ago his principal mandates were to revamp Dartmouth’s entrepreneurship program and to lead a revision of the college’s intellectual property policy to make it more accommodating to Dartmouth faculty, staff and students.
In March, Dartmouth’s trustees adopted a new policy on patents and copyrights that grants college community members greater ownership over the products that spring from their intellectual work.
Gerngross was also put in charge of the then-newly formed OETT to oversee the existing Dartmouth Entrepreneurial Network, Dartmouth Regional Technology Center, and the Technology Transfer Office. Davis, a 1990 Dartmouth alumnus, was hired from the University of Virginia as executive director of the reorganized programs.
The purpose of the reorganization was to improve promotion of entrepreneurship at Dartmouth and improve facilitating the commercial application of technology developed in college laboratories and research. Both endeavors are seen by the college as crucial in its ability to attract and retain engineering and business school faculty who may have lucrative offers from other institutions and businesses.
“We set the institution on a new course,” Gerngross said of his and Davis’ work over the past three years. “We put in place a new team and took it to the next level.”
He said it was the “right time” to step down from administration to turn his attention to his startup businesses and teaching.
The changes within Dartmouth’s entrepreneurship program under Gerngross were not without detractors, however, especially among former students who were angered over the departure of Gregg Fairbrothers, the founder of the Dartmouth Entrepreneurs Network who also taught entrepreneurship at Tuck. In 2014, Dartmouth eliminated Fairbrothers’ position at DEN and did not renew his teaching contract, leading many to conclude that he was a victim of academic politics.
Gerngross, a professor of bioengineering, has launched several companies, including Lebanon-based biotech firms Adimab and GlycoFi, the latter of which he and Thayer professor Charles Hutchinson sold to Merck & Co. for $400 million in 2006. Merck recently moved GlycoFi’s activities out of the Dartmouth Regional Technology Center at Centerra Park in Lebanon to other Merck facilities in other states.
Davis said that he expects to continue adjunct teaching at Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business in addition to his “full-time, day job” at Fresh Air Sensor, also based at the DRTC. Fresh Air Sensor developed a device that detects second-hand cigarette and marijuana smoke and then relays the information via WiFi.
“In management, you decide to continue what you’re doing or look for the next mountain to climb,” Davis said in an interview. “I’m someone who looks for interesting challenges.”
The changes are not expected to affect the two other senior administrators brought aboard as part of reorganization: Nila Bhakuni, director of technology transfer in the office of entrepreneurship; and Jamie Couglin, director of entrepreneurship and the DEN Innovation Center, a program space and networking hub for aspiring entrepreneurs at Dartmouth on Currier Place in downtown Hanover.
Whether Dartmouth will appoint new administrators to fill the positions vacated by succeed Gerngross and Davis or assign their responsibilities among existing staff is not known.
“When it comes to the details surrounding what exactly comes next, we are still in the planning stage,” Dartmouth spokesman Justin Anderson said in an email.
John Lippman can be reached at jlippman@vnews.com or 603-727-3217.
