Carryer named 2008 Bishoff Entrepreneur-in-Residence

The engineering entrepreneurship program has named Babs Carryer as its fall 2008 Bishoff Entrepreneur-in-Residence.

Carryer was co-founder, president and chief executive officer of RemComm Inc., a provider of radio-based emergency communications. During the course of her tenure at RemComm, Carryer developed three software products from idea to commercial product. Carryer has been president of Carryer Consulting for 14 years, providing strategic marketing and business planning services to technology companies and organizations in the software and life sciences sectors.

Carryer is widely experienced in the start-up community, having been involved with hundreds of early-stage companies seeking financing, growth or acquisition partners. She co-founded LaunchCyte LLC, a development company that creates, seeds and harvests life sciences innovations from leading research universities across the United States. Carryer is also the firm's past president and remains a consultant and board member. Currently, LaunchCyte has six life sciences portfolio companies, with a combined value of approximately $150 million.

Carryer has a master's in management from Carnegie Mellon University, where she teaches entrepreneurship at the Don Jones Center for Entrepreneurship in the Tepper School of Business. She also teaches entrepreneurship at the Heinz School at Carnegie Mellon as part of the master's of information systems, the master's of entertainment industry management and the master's of medical management programs. Carryer also works in Carnegie Mellon's computer science department as part of Project Olympus, which focuses on commercializing innovations. Additionally, Carryer teaches new technology commercialization through the University of Pittsburgh's Offices of Enterprise Development and Technology Management.

Carryer will be visiting Penn State Sept. 24 to 26, co-teaching in the entrepreneurship minor courses, meeting with student entrepreneur teams and meeting with faculty and staff involved in technology commercialization.

The Entrepreneur-in-Residence program is named for and underwritten with an endowment by E.V. Bishoff, who was a Pittsburgh native and long-time supporter of Penn State engineering. The program contributes to the engineering entrepreneurship program's mission to develop new entrepreneurs and creative thinkers through innovation, leadership and project-based coursework.