This award provides support to Dr. Elaine Romanelli under the National Science Foundation's Presidential Young Investigator Awards program. The objectives of this program are to provide research support to the Nation's most outstanding and promising young science and engineering faculty. The awards are intended to improve the capability of U.S. academic institutions to respond to the demand for highly qualified science and engineering personnel for academic and industrial research and teaching. Dr. Romanelli has already made significant research contributions to the field of Organization Theory, and has the potential to become a leader in academic research and education. This award will allow the investigator to pursue her research interest relating to the origins, processes, and outcomes of entrepreneurship in high technology industries. Much of Dr. Romanelli's career research focuses on the organizational backgrounds of founders of biotechnology research and product development firms. These studies will illuminate the dynamic underpinnings of entrepreneurial processes in industries. In particular, better understanding of industry and organizational conditions that "produce" entrepreneurs will lay an important groundwork for analysis of when and why new firms are founded, as well as their impact on changes in industry competitive structures over time.
