MIT rewards and recognizes excellence in entrepreneurship through awards overseen by the Trust Center for both students (the McGovern Award) and mentors (the Monosson Prize).
The annual awards are given out at our Celebration of Entrepreneurship event in the spring, where the entire MIT entrepreneurial ecosystem gathers to salute the achievements of our students over the course of the academic year.
News Pieces
The Charles and Amanda Kane Entrepreneurship Award
The Adolf F. Monosson ’48 Prize for Entrepreneurship Mentoring
In 2024, the Trust Center introduced the Charles and Amanda Kane Entrepreneurship Award (formerly known as the Patrick J. McGovern, Jr. ’59 Entrepreneurship Award) to be presented annually to an individual student or student team that has made a significant impact on the quality, visibility, and overall spirit of entrepreneurship education and support across the Institute. Any MIT student or student team is eligible for this Award that honors Charles and Amanda Kane for their support for entrepreneurs and contributions to the Institute community.
2023
Neelesh Bagga
Product Manager for Orbit, MIT Sloan Entrepreneurship Club
Sam Broner
Trust Center Student Board, T.A. for E&I Track, Generative AI Summit
Janice Lam
MIT Sloan Entrepreneurship Club, DE Lab
2022
Sarah Moseson
Trust Center Undergraduate Student Board of Advisors, Founder & Chair
Ben Spector
Teaching Assistant, 15.390 New Enterprises
Ryan Strobel
Lead Teaching Assistant, Entrepreneurial Sales
2021
David Begun, Navroop Singh Sehmi
MIT Orbit development team
Kevin D. Johnson
KINETIC
2020
Stephanie MacConnell
Healthcare Sector Practice Leader
2019
Anthony Cheng, Adam Zhao
Co-directors, StartLabs
2018
Gregory Ekchian
Healthcare Sector Practice Leader
Ingrid Oelschlager
Teaching Assistant, “Scaling Entrepreneurial Ventures” & “Introduction to Technological Entrepreneurship”
2017
Jacob Lowenstein, Helen Smith
Creative Arts Sector Practice Leaders
2016
Alessandra Henderson, Natalie Pitcher, Isaac Stoner, Liz Voeller
Sector Practice Leaders
2015
Carlos Sanchez Altable
MIT FinTech Club, Financial Innovation
Dan Elitzer, Jeremy Rubin
MIT Bitcoin Project
2014
Andrea Ippolito
Hacking Medicine
2013
Allen Cheng, Elliot Cohen, Allison Yost
Hacking Medicine
Colin Sidoti
undergraduate entrepreneurship support and outreach
Will Whitney
StartLabs
2012
Kevin Clough, William Evans, Romi Kadri, Alexander List, Birju Shah, Parul Singh, Brett van Zuiden
application of advanced entrepreneurial techniques
2011
Vanessa Green
MIT Energy Conference
Melinda Hale, Jarrod Phipps
Building Bridges
Rene Reinsberg
Linked Data Ventures, Startup Central
Nathan Trujillo
MIT Entrepreneurship Review
2010
Erdin Beshimov, Rob Lemos, Eduard Viladesau
MIT Entrepreneurship Review
2009
Brian Cantwell, Amy Fazen, Diana Huidobro, Sombit Mishra, Lara Pierpoint, Pedro Santos, Marcio von Muhlen
MIT Clean Energy Prize, MIT Energy Club
2008
Gaetan Bonhomme, Doug Bright, Freddy Kerrest, Jeff Sabados
MIT $100K Entrepreneurship Competition
2007
Deric Corwin, Karina Drees, Josephine Duh, John Harthorne, Alex Min, Trond Wuellner
MIT $100K Entrepreneurship Competition
2006
Ore Adeyemi, Jeff Coker, Anil Dharni, Bernard Lupien, Yulia Poltorak, Mark Roberge, Vineet Thuvara
outstanding work, both in and outside of the classroom
2005
Joost Bonsen, Tony Chen, Max Feng, Jason Fuller, Mehdi Gazor, Ali Khademhoseini, John Lock, Samuel Ngai, Jose Pacheco
Chairs/Founders and Co-Presidents of TechLink
2004
Omer Cedar, Hans Tung
iTeams
2003
Brian Curtis, Joern Kallmeyer, Craig Rottenberg, Julie Smith, Dave Spector, Mike Volpe
Sloan Entrepreneurs
2002
Pablo Acosta, Eitan Becker, Julie Chang, Pavel Krapivin, Michael Parduhn, Anne Pelz, Sherwin Soo, Jelena Spasojevic, Ajay Sudan
MIT $50K Competition
2001
Olalekan Akinyanmi, Norma Castro, Jeffrey Chi, Panida Chinsupakul, Ann Cho, Kathryn Cosgrove, Michael Falcon, Rami Habal, David Lam, Hai Ning, Abel Sanchez, Julian Ting, Jennifer Wu
eMIT
2000
Rohini Chakravarthy, Ramzi Nassar, Laura Dorival Paglione, Joel Serface, Rodrigo Soares, Jeffrey Williams
MIT/Sloan Venture Capital and Principal Investing Club
Created to honor the memory of Adolf F. “Sonny” Monosson ’48, the prize recognizes entrepreneurship mentors who have committed their time, energy, and/or capital toward future generations of entrepreneurs. Established at the Sloan School of Management and made possible by Mr. & Mrs. William S. Grinker ’56, the prize continues Monosson’s mission of providing mentoring to potential entrepreneurs.
2023
Brian Halligan
2022
Jim Baum
2021
Jinane Abounadi
2020
Kirk Arnold
2019
Bob Metcalfe
2018
Trish Cotter
2017
Shari Loessberg
2016
Elaine Chen
2015
Jonathan Fleming
2014
Zen Chu
2013
Bill Aulet
2012
Charles Cooney, Gururaj “Desh” Deshpande, Leon Sandler
2011
Jean Hammond
2010
Howard Anderson
2009
Trish Fleming, Antoinette Matthews
2008
Edward B. Roberts
2007
Alec Dingee, Lou Goldish, Sherwin Greenblatt, David Staelin
2006
Joseph G. Hadzima, Jr.
2005
Aaron Kleiner
PROFILES
Charles Kane is a Senior Lecturer in TIES and also in Global Economics and Management at the MIT Sloan School of Management. Kane currently serves on the Boards of Symbotic (SYM); Alkami (ALKT); Progress Software (PRGS); Workhuman Ltd.; Aareon GmbH; and Acoustic Technologies. Kane also served on the Boards of Demandware (DWRE, acquired by Salesforce); Realpages (RP, acquired by Thoma Bravo); Netezza (NZ, acquired by IBM); Carbonite (CARB, acquired by Open Text); Click Software (acquired by Salesforce); Borland Software (BORL, acquired by Micro Focus); Applix Software (APLX, acquired by IBM); Precisely Software (acquired by Clearlake LLC) and multiple other private companies. He served as Audit Chairman for all of the aforementioned companies.
Kane served as Chairman of the One Laptop per Child (OLPC) Foundation and was previously the President of OLPC, a nonprofit spun out from MIT to enhance education in less developed countries. Prior to OLPC, Kane was a founding investor and COO of Global BPO Services Corp., a Special Purpose Acquisition Corp. that merged with Stream Global Services (acquired by Ares Capital).
Prior to Global BPO, Kane was the CFO of RSA Security (acquired by EMC); CFO of Aspen Technology; president and CEO of Corechange, Inc. (acquired by Open Text); CFO of Informix Software (acquired by IBM). He has also served in financial executive positions at Stratus Computer, Prime Computer, and Deloitte.
Throughout his career, Kane has been involved in developing and executing sophisticated financial strategies in globalizing corporations and mergers and acquisitions. He is a frequent speaker and writer on these topics, as well as other international financial topics and social entrepreneurial ventures.
Kane is also a founding member of the Hult Global Challenge which is now part of the Clinton Global Initiative and is the coauthor of the book Learning to Change the World—the Social Impact of One Laptop per Child.
He is married to Dr. Amanda Kane, a historian at the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, and has two children.
The Monosson prize recognizes the advice and counsel Adolf “Sonny” Monosson provided to classmates, clients, competitors, friends and students on entrepreneurial enterprises. Monosson was recognized by his peers and the press as a voice of reason.
In a business career that spanned 55 years after his graduation from MIT in 1948, Sonny Monosson created more than 10 businesses in the finance, publishing, computer and leasing industries. He invested his time and capital in many other startup enterprises and counseled hundreds of entrepreneurs and would-be entrepreneurs on the personal skills necessary for success.
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