Sherwin Greenblatt Guest Commentary
"Sherwin Greenblatt and the Bose story is a tour de force of technology entrepreneurship. Glenn Mangurian’s interview with Mr. Greenblatt provides a textbook quality to a story that should be required reading by all aspiring entrepreneurs whether engineers, scientists or business majors. All businesses that are successful in today’s economy are conceptual. Bose products are not just a collection of electronic components, but a beautifully conceived product concept executed to perfection. How they arrived at this concept and how they bootstrapped the business is extraordinary.
In today’s economy it is no longer the ability to manufacture a product that is value-added. It is the intellectual ideas that are embodied in the product that constitute value. Mr. Greenblatt beautifully explains how it is necessary for success as a technology entrepreneur to merge technological know-how with marketing savvy. He and Dr. Bose may be engineers by training, but they surely learned quickly and embraced the fundamentals of marketing - namely the need to do something different that provides value to the customers and do it better than anybody else.
Students engaged in science and engineering research also need business fundamentals as part of their university education, especially an appreciation of the market focus. This integrated view of science, engineering and business, so well exemplified by Sherwin Greenblatt, is the fundamental principle upon which the interdisciplinary Isenberg Program on the UMass Amherst campus is founded. We will make this interview required reading for all the students in our Isenberg Program for Technology Management!"
Soren Bisgaard
Eugene M. Isenberg Professor of Integrative Studies
Dean, Eugene M. Isenberg School of Management
University of Massachusetts Amherst 
Michael F. Malone, ‘79G
Ronnie and Eugene M. Isenberg Distinguished Professor
Dean of Engineering, UMass Amherst
"Sherwin Greenblatt indicated that he and Dr. Bose wanted to create a company whose mission was to develop new technology and to find a way to use the technology in products that would make people’s lives better. This simple yet power mission statement demonstrates why a young company needs to put forth a compelling value proposition that is embraced by all of the employees and that is endurable. Too many companies articulate mission statements and values that do not resonate with their employees, thus depriving the company of a tremendous way to align everyone’s interests and objectives.
Another key takeaway from the Pioneers of Innovation piece on Bose is the obvious fact that people are key. The Bose team failed in their first product launch, but because the founders and early team members possessed a powerful” refuse to lose” mentality, they persevered despite their initial setbacks and challenges. Being willing to unselfishly devote a tremendous amount of time and energy in a cause one passionately believes in will always make a difference. Great technology, market opportunities, and patents will never create value on their own without a unwavering and fully energized team to exploit them.
Lastly, another important lesson mentioned by Sherwin relates to the very early understanding that the business would need to scale. Because they worried about scalability at the outset, the founders put in robust systems and processes and utilized adaptive business models to help ensure that the underpinnings of the business would be able to grow and respond to the underlying needs and expansion of the business. Many businesses fail to adapt or innovate their systems and processes, leading to disasters when they do not scale. The recent fiasco experienced by Jet Blue stands in sharp contrast to the success achieved by Bose Corporation."
John Brooks '72
Founding Partner
Prism Ventures
"From the lab to commercialization, to one of the most successful private companies in the country: Without Sherwin we would not have Bose Corporation nor their tremendous audio products that make our world a better place. Sherwin's technical abilities combined with his capitalistic insights drove this company to where it is today: the preeminent leader in the audio space. Hearing Sherwin speak was a sincere pleasure."
Edward C. Williams, III '87
Partner
Brook Venture Partners