From Auto Execs to Apple Evangelist, Lively Cast to Star in Fall Dean’s Speaker Series

A former Polish prime minister, two former automobile executives, one of Apple's best-known evangelists, and the industrial designer who put the bunny ears on the XO One Laptop Per Child computers will headline the Dean's Speaker Series this fall.

Marek Belka, president of the the National Bank of Poland and the country's former prime minister, will kick off the Dean's Speaker Series with his talk Tuesday, Aug. 30, at 12:30 p.m. in the Wells Fargo Room. To register, visit the Dean's Speaker Series website.

September will feature a talk by former Apple chief evangelist Guy Kawasaki, on Sept. 28.

In October, the series will include talks by industrial designer Yves Behar (Oct. 3) and former Volkswagen CEO Carl Hahn (Oct. 11). Alumnus Bob Lutz, BS 61, MBA 62, retired vice chairman of General Motors, will speak at Haas on Nov. 3.

Guy Kawasaki: Serial Entrepreneur

Kawasaki, a Silicon Valley venture capitalist and one of Apple's first evangelists in the early 1980s, will speak at Haas at 12:30 p.m. Sept. 28 in the Wells Fargo Room. His talk will touch on his 10th book, Enchantment: The Art of Changing Hearts, Minds, and Actions, published in March.

Kawasaki’s story begins in a tough part of Honolulu and continues on to a gig with a jeweler, a business degree at UCLA, and co-founding several companies. As Apple's chief evangelist, Kawasaki was charged with selling the “Macintosh Way” to software and hardware developers and lead “the charge against world-wide domination by IBM,” as he writes on his website, guykawasaki.com.

After leaving Apple in the late 1980s, Kawasaki ran a Macintosh database company; wrote for Macworld and Forbes; started a software company called Fog City Software; and created the emailer and a listserv called LetterRip. He also started an angel investor matchmaking service called Garage.com, now called Garage Technology Ventures, and founded Alltop, an online magazine rack.

Yves Behar: Mixing Design with Business

Behar, founder of San Francisco-based design studio fuseproject, will speak at Haas at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 3 in the Wells Fargo Room.

Behar has attracted clients in the technology, furniture, fashion and sports sectors and overseen projects that have won more than 150 awards. Behar's speaking engagements have included the 2009 World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos, Switzerland.

Closer to home, Behar has served as a judge for the final tradeshow of Haas Senior Lecturer Sara Beckman's Managing the New Product Development class. In 2007, he was so impressed with the project of two students–Jason Kibbey, MBA 08, and Jeff Denby, MBA 08—that he became a partner in PACT, their startup organic underwear business, whose designs are inspired by the causes supported by the company.

Behar’s philosophy centers on what he calls “design from the inside out,” capitalizing on the combination of technological innovation and design. Thanks to his expertise, he has been able to develop a partnership with mobile phone headset company Jawbone and work on various furniture projects for Herman Miller, as well as packaging for Puma and a new brand for the Mini Cooper.

Stay tuned for future articles on Carl Hahn and Bob Lutz, both former automobile executives, as their lectures approach.

Registration is required for all Dean's Speaker Series events and is accessible on the series' website: haas.berkeley.edu/haas/about/deansspeakers.html.

Yves Behar, Industrial Designer
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