On June 1, 2018, the IC² Institute held a book launch and signing for A Civic Entrepreneur: The Life of Technology Visionary George Kozmetsky by Monty Jones.
The signing was attended by members of the Kozmetsky family, IC² Institute Fellows and staff, UT Austin faculty, and associates of Dr. Kozmetsky including former UT president William H. Cunningham and Admiral Bobby Ray Inman.
The volume is the first book-length biography of George Kozmetsky, the founder of the IC² Institute. It is scheduled for publication in July by the Briscoe Center for American History. It is available for pre-order at UT Press and Amazon.
Throughout his career as an industrialist, educator, visionary supporter of new technologies, advocate for worldwide economic development, and philanthropist, George Kozmetsky promoted constructive interactions among the worlds of academia, government, and private-sector business. He personified these interactions as a founder of Teledyne, a dean of the business school at the University of Texas at Austin, an academic researcher at the university’s IC² Institute, a promoter of new technologies, and a consultant to entrepreneurs and government agencies.
In this comprehensive biography, Monty Jones details all aspects of Kozmetsky’s life, from his childhood as the son of Russian immigrants, to his service in World War II, to his accomplishments in technology, education, and business. While Kozmetsky is most widely known for taking early steps to propel the business school at The University of Texas at Austin toward its current position as an internationally prominent institution and for playing a central role in the economic transformation of Austin from a sleepy college town to its present-day status as a center of high-technology research, development, and manufacturing, Jones also details Kozmetsky’s technology career, influence, and philosophy. Kozmetsky embodied the concept of “civic entrepreneurship,” which involves a merging of business acumen, a deep commitment to social responsibility, and visionary leadership for a community’s economic development. Inherent in Kozmetsky’s role as a civic entrepreneur was the broadest possible definition of “community,” beginning with one’s city and region but growing outward to encompass the globe.
Monty Jones is a former public affairs official at UT Austin and the UT System, and a former reporter on higher education at the Austin American-Statesman. He is co-author, with William H. Cunningham, of The Texas Way: Money, Power, Politics, and Ambition at the University.
Thanks to the generosity of the author, IC² had a supply of prerelease copies of the book for sale. Funds from the book sales will be applied to support student participation in IC²’s Aspiring Women Entrepreneurs program. The program will support 18 women student innovators from Indian universities to prepare to commercialize their innovations with the help of students from UT Austin and Luleå Technical University in Sweden. Students will meet this summer in Austin, India and Sweden to develop commercialization strategies for each technology on all three continents and compare the results to find the best path to market for each innovation. This unique program is a fitting legacy to the vision of George and Ronya Kozmetsky.
Monty Jones with members of the Kozmetsky family
Monty Jones with William H. Cunningham
Last year, the National Science Foundation’s Operations Engineering (ENG) and the Law & Social Sciences Program (SBE) funded the BBR and the human trafficking team at UT’s School of Social Work to hold an interdisciplinary workshop to explore the intersection of operations research (OR) methods and the problem of human trafficking (Grant # CMMI-1726895). The goal was to convene an interdisciplinary team of scholars to identify promising research directions for applications of OR and data analytics toward the disruption of illicit supply networks like human trafficking. The United States Department of State considers human trafficking a form of modern-day slavery and broadly defines it as when a person is deceived or coerced in situations of prostitution, forced labor, or domestic servitude. Human trafficking is but one of a number of illicit networks; others include arms trafficking, drug trafficking, animal trafficking, and human smuggling. By bringing together scholars from disparate disciplines, the workshop identified new research approaches and breakthrough strategies for disrupting the illicit networks commonly found in human trafficking.
Clay Spinuzzi, a professor in the UT Austin Department of Rhetoric and Writing, has received the 2018 CCCC Technical and Scientific Communication Award in the category of Best Original Collection of Essays in Technical or Scientific Communication.
