Toronto - A professor at the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management has received a $976,000 (US) grant from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation to study the economics of knowledge contribution and distribution.
Joshua Gans, who is a professor of strategic management and the holder of the Jeffrey S. Skoll Chair of Technical Innovation and Entrepreneurship, will lead the research project with Prof. Fiona Murray of MIT's Sloan School of Management.
The three-year project will encourage research designed to generate understanding the economic drivers of scientific contributions and to analyze the impact of digitization on knowledge contribution. It aims to provide a framework for utilizing social science evidence for key policy areas such as openness in science, the promotion of information through digital means and guidelines to assist non-governmental and other organizations in fostering creativity efficiently.
The main activities of the program will be to fund research in this area around the world as well as disseminate it through a new web-site, a series of workshops and a policy-relevant summit to be staged in 2013. An Executive Board to guide the program's direction has already been established with initial membership from Professor Martha Gray (MIT), Professor Paula Stephan (GSU), Professor Philippe Aghion (Harvard) and Ling Wong (Gates Foundation).
Prof. Gans joined the Rotman School in July, 2011. Prior to 2011, he was the Foundation Professor of Management (Information Economics) at the Melbourne Business School, University of Melbourne and prior to that he was at the School of Economics, University of New South Wales. In 2011, he was a visiting researcher at Microsoft Research (New England). Prof. Gans holds a Ph.D. from Stanford University and an honours degree in economics from the University of Queensland.
At the Rotman School, he teaches MBA and Commerce students Network and Digital Market Strategy. He recently co-founded the blog, Digitopoly, digitopoly.org, that examines competition in the digital economy. While his research interests are varied Prof. Gans has developed specialties in the nature of technological competition and innovation, economic growth, industrial organization and regulatory economics.
The Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto is redesigning business education for the 21st century with a curriculum based on Integrative Thinking. Located in the world's most diverse city, the Rotman School fosters a new way to think that enables the design of creative business solutions. The School is currently raising $200 million to ensure Canada has the world-class business school it deserves. For more information, visit www.rotman.utoronto.ca.
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