IE Dean Ikhlaq Sidhu Welcomes Students to Berkeley Leadership Week

Ikhlaq Sidhu, Dean of IE School of Science and Technology spoke to the 70 students participating in the Berkeley Leadership Week in Segovia about the differences in entrepreneurship in Silicon Valley and Europe.

Highlighting the differences in culture, sources of capital and the size of the markets, Sidhu told students the different mentality allowed for different strengths.

“Europe is strong in deep tech.”
Ikhlaq Sidhu, Dean of IE School of Science and Technology

“Europe has been funding deep tech in ways that even the U.S. has not done in the past. This includes areas from energy fusion to bio-convergence. And Europe is now becoming more focused on technology sovereignty, because technology is important and Europe will need to be able to function without major global technology dependencies,” Sidhu said.

The Berkeley Leadership Week, taking place in Segovia from July 10-14, is organized by the European Innovation Academy and pulls together top students in a summit focused on entrepreneurship and leadership. This year, seven students from IE School of Science and Technology won slots to participate in the event alongside the predominantly U.S. students.

IE students applauded the opportunity to network with students in the Berkeley program and the unique way the activities stimulated interaction amongst the participants while focusing on entrepreneurship and leadership.

“We do a lot of games and teamwork, as well as lectures. Because we are all living together in the same residence, we also do homework after the lessons together,” said IE student Alicia Vera Peña. “It leads us to bond a lot as a team and as a class.”

The Berkeley Leadership Week is a part of the partnership signed between IE and the Sutardja Center for Entrepreneurship & Technology (SCET) at the University of California, Berkeley to help facilitate global collaboration between the UC Berkeley Sutardja Center and IE University students, faculty, and innovators.