Laura B. Cardinal, the SmartState Endowed Chair in the SmartState Center for Innovation + Commercialization, was selected by her colleagues to serve as the chair of the SmartState Council of Chairs. Cardinal, who is also a faculty member of the University of South Carolina Darla Moore School of Business, will lead the next Council of Chairs’ annual meeting, which will be held in Columbia, SC, in May 2020.
The SmartState Council of Chairs is composed of the 75 endowed chairs who hold faculty positions within South Carolina’s three major research universities: Clemson University, the Medical University of South Carolina and the University of South Carolina. The endowed chairs reside within 51 SmartState Centers of Economic Excellence in six industry clusters designated by for the SmartState Program. The SmartState Endowed Chairs conduct research designed to spark economic development in the form of new technology and startup companies, engage and support corporate partners, and create learning opportunities for South Carolina college students, the workforce of the future.
Cardinal was named the SmartState Endowed Chair for Innovation + Commercialization in 2016. She teaches a highly popular course within the Moore School’s Professional MBA program called Strategic Management of Technology and Innovation (SMTI) that teaches students from business and science disciplines how to manage and leverage innovation in business.