Deshpande Symposium Explores Entrepreneurship & Innovation at Arizona State University SkySong Campus

​The dramatic SkySong campus in Scottsdale, AZ was the perfect background for the 12th Annual Deshpande Symposium, June 5-7, 2023.  The event attracted 200 attendees from across the US, Canada, and India for keynotes, panels, the awards dinner, and pre-conference special activities.   EEC Ohio was well represented at the conference, with many members serving on panels. 

The Deshpande Awards Ceremony took place at the renowned Heard Museum in Phoenix, offering the opportunity to visit an outstanding collection of American Indian art.  

ASU SkySong’s multi-building campus offers programs and space aimed at fostering corporate engagement, entrepreneurship, education, technology, and innovation.  

​ASU SkySong serves as an innovation center designed to help companies grow by providing business services and programs. Philip Gaskin, VP of Entrepreneurship, Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, kicked off the Symposium with his remarks on Organizing for Innovation in Entrepreneurial Ecosystems. 

The pre-conference activities on June 5 invited attendees to visit programs on the ASU Tempe campus:  Generator Labs and Dreamscape Learn at ASU.  The Generator organizes the ASU Innovation Open, a competition designed to challenge and advance university student innovators who aim to develop hard tech ventures.

Attendees learned how to effectively design and deploy the needed ecosystem elements to support budding university student entrepreneurs, how to sustainably operate the associated venture competition, and how to successfully engage all the key stakeholders.  

At Dreamscape, conference-goers were treated to a presentation on Learning through Virtual Reality.  We entered an immersive experience with virtual worlds, cutting-edge technology, and captivating storytelling.  These programs are now utilized to help ASU students studying introductory biology, and have been shown to improve academic performance.  

​Deshpande Symposium 2024 will be held at the University of Maryland, with dates to be announced soon.