David Washburn is Executive Director of the Michigan State University Foundation, a non-profit research foundation associated with Michigan State University. The Foundation manages a $475M investment portfolio and grants the proceeds of this portfolio back into Michigan State University programs that drive economic development initiatives. Dave also serves as the President and board member of all MSU Foundation subsidiary companies including Spartan Innovations, Red Cedar Ventures, University Corporate Research Park and MBI International. He also serves on the board of the Lansing Development Finance Authority and in 2015 was appointed by Governor Rick Snyder to the Executive Committee of the MEDC.Prior to MSU, Dave was President and CEO of the University of Tennessee Research Foundation (UTRF) from 2011-2014 based in Knoxville. In this capacity, he led UT’s technology transfer operations and was involved at all aspects of UTRF subsidiary organizations. Prior to Tennessee, Dave was Senior Technology Manager at the Office of Technology Management at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) from 2001 to 2011 where he led the software commercialization practice and helped form 25 startup companies.
Dave has held management positions in a number of venture backed software companies in Illinois primarily in the scientific software and programming tools sectors. His early business career included positions in sales, marketing and international business development, including subsidiary launches in Europe. Through out his career he had exposure to business start ups and ventures operations interacting with some of the largest companies in the world.
Originally from Chicago, Dave grew up in Champaign. He holds a BA and MBA from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign as well as the CLP designation from the Licensing Executives Society.