University of Michigan

Hallman Fellows Shape the Future of Business

Hallman Fellow M.S. Krishnan and his colleagues have a vision for the future of business.

April 28, 2009

If the aviation industry had advanced their technology as rapidly as the computer industry, says former Boeing Vice President and Microsoft President and COO Michael Hallman (BBA ’66, MBA ’67), the flight from New York to L.A. would take 14 seconds and cost 95 cents.

The e-business innovations of the last 30 years helped create today’s hyperlinked—and hyperspeed—global marketplace. Michael Hallman created the Michael R. and Mary Kay Hallman Fellows program at U-M’s Stephen M. Ross School of Business to support Michigan faculty working to understand and inspire business innovation. Their findings may help fuel the next cycle of economic growth.

The six current Fellows come from every area of the field, from marketing to IT to law. “The program was designed to be very open-ended,” Hallman says, “because the industry is changing all the time. Fifteen years ago no one knew what Bill Gates meant when he set the goal of putting information at everyone’s fingertips. Today, you can look anywhere in the Ross School and see how far-reaching the efforts have been, and how fast his goal is being realized. It’s hard to even envision what will be happening fifteen years from now.”

Corporate IT expert and Hallman Fellow M. S. Krishnan may have some of the answers. “Two emerging trends—ubiquitous connectivity and products with ‘embedded intelligence’—are breaking down industry barriers and shifting power to consumers,” Krishnan explains. “The flexibility of the Hallman Fellowship allows me to pursue the most promising ideas about how innovation happens in this new environment. And Mike Hallman’s engagement with the Fellows greatly enriches our research experience.”

With massive shifts in the global economy, the future of business depends more than ever on the best new ideas. By creating the Hallman Fellows program, Michael Hallman demonstrates philanthropy’s power to accelerate business innovation.