Return to Virginia Business - February 2002

High-level defections are plaguing Virginia universities. First, political historian Francis Fukuyama, whose seminal book "The End of History" set the agenda for political thinking nationally in the early 1990s, bolted from George Mason University for Johns Hopkins University's foreign affairs graduate school. Now a Virginia Tech highflyer, Ted Rappaport, is Texas-bound. He's headed for the University of Texas at Austin this summer.

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Rappaport's departure is a big loss for Tech. The professor of electrical engineering and wireless communication expert was instrumental in helping develop new standards that allow for academic entrepreneurship without compromising ethics. Virginia Tech officials believe that by allowing professors and graduate students to share materially in their discoveries, the college will be better able to attract and retain bright minds. They want to boost Tech's standing as a nationally recognized research center - no easy task given the intense competition for talent.

To that end, Rappaport launched Wireless Valley, a nonprofit firm that holds patents and pays industry-level salaries to its mostly student staff. He also helped found the university's Mobile Portable Radio Research Group to snare extra research money.

Rappaport says that Texas courted him after a national search, following the departure of two of its top wireless people. A Tech spokeswoman says that the move towards entrepreneurship won't die at Tech after Rappaport departs. MPRG, which Rappaport established in 1999, has seen its grants grow from $1.4 million to $2.2 million. Other entrepreneurial-minded professors will push on in Rappaport's place.

- Peter Galuszka