Meteosim organizes the seminar, “Global Sales and Innovation Strategies for Ambitious Tech Companies”, delivered by Ken Morse at the Scientific Park in Barcelona
Ken Morse has been a high performance leader in high-tech global sales and sales management for 35 years.
He co-founded six high-technology companies, together with some friends and colleagues from MIT. Five of these entrepreneurial initiatives were the subject of successful IPOs and mergers, while the sixth was a disaster. Among them were 3Com Corporation; Aspen Technology, Inc.; a Chinese trading company; a biotechnology business venture, and an expert systems company. Morse was the CEO or was in charge of part or all of the sales organisation in these new companies. During his more than four years as managing director of AspenTech (AZPN) Europe SA/NV, his team managed to fulfil their sales objectives for 18 consecutive quarters by establishing strong strategic relationships with the leading chemical and pharmaceutical companies in the region. He expanded the AspenTech EMEA organisation from the 22 initial employees to more than 200, with basically no staff turnover, and he multiplied sales revenue by 600 to 900% by means of his relations with key customers.
His interest in international high-tech business ventures began at MIT, where he graduated in Political Science in 1968, and in 1972 he obtained an MBA at Harvard Business School. After graduation, he joined Schroders, the commercial bank with its headquarters in the United Kingdom, where he was personal assistant to Jim Wolfensohn, former chairman of the World Bank.
In 1975, Morse set up a sales consulting firm, with the backing of the Chase Manhattan Bank, to help U.S. companies with a technological foundation, such as IBM, General Motors, Gillette, Hughes Aircraft, Mine Safety Appliances, Waters Associates and others, to break into the Chinese market. He was based in Beijing for five years, which coincided with the second half of the Cultural Revolution. In 1980, he relocated to Silicon Valley as a founding member of 3Com Corporation.
During the 13 years in which he acted as founder and managing director of the MIT Entrepreneurship Center, the number of students enrolling on entrepreneurship courses rose from 220 to 1,600 annually, and the number of teachers increased from 3 to 36. Morse was named “Education All Star” by Mass High Tech magazine and is a member of the MIT Enterprise Forum Global Board.
He has also been designated a member of the recently created National Advisory Council on Innovation & Entrepreneurship, by secretary Locke and President Obama (Washington), and he is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations (New York City).
Morse is also a member of the Telefónica Disruptive Council, of the advisory council of Citi SFS, at Barcelona HiT: Hothouse of Innovation & Technology and of the Panel of External Experts of GNS Science in New Zealand. He is also a marketing consultant for Scottish Enterprise.
He is a member of the advisory council of several ambitious start-ups, including Denkwerk GmbH in Germany; iMotions – Emotion Technology ApS y Zylinc A/S in Denmark; The Little Engineer in Lebanon; Aifos Solutions SL, Indisys and Invenio in Spain; Izon Science Ltd in New Zealand; Naseeb Networks and Sofizar en Pakistan; Dynasil Corporation and several spin-offs of the MIT in the US, including Cogito, FloDesign Sonics, Inc., Terrafugia and UkuMi.
He is a visiting professor at the ESADE Business School in Barcelona and is the head professor of Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Competitiveness at Delft University of Technology (Netherlands).
He has taught classes in workshops on the development of entrepreneurial skills in Europe, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, New Zealand, Quebec and the United States, for more than eight years.
Ken speaks fluent French and has some knowledge of Chinese. He is a member of the Cercle Royal Gaulois Artistique & Littéraire of Brussels. Ken is currently a visiting professor at the ESADE Business School in Barcelona.
