A national conference focused on investing in the senior housing market is not something that sounds too familiar with Rady MBA students.  To the FlexWeekend ‘19 cohort, the seemingly unlikely connection all started from the Lab to Market program last spring when students were taught to create business ideas through unfair advantages identified during their career experiences. One of the many business ideas presented to Professor Vish Krishnan at the end of the course was about an autonomous health monitoring system for elderly people. For Lijun Liu and I, this was just the beginning phase of a great learning experience on entrepreneurship at the Rady School of Management. While continuing the research on the senior care market, we got connected with Paul Mullin, Senior VP of Silverado Care, who then introduced us to Chuck Harry, Chief of Research and Analytics at the National Investment Center for Seniors Housing & Care (NIC). Through scholarships offered by NIC, both Lijun and I attended the organization’s annual Fall conference in Chicago, along with 17 other students from 12 prestigious academic institutes, including Columbia, Cornell and the University of Wisconsin.

NIC is a nonprofit organization that supports housing access and choice for America’s seniors by providing data, analytics and connections that bring together investors and providers in all phases of senior care. The original goal we had was to learn about the senior housing and care market through the conference. We were interested in attending some of the educational presentations and panel discussions regarding senior housing and care and were hoping to secure some networking opportunities. As we found out later on, this conference is a huge platform for business engagement, negotiation and transactions in the senior housing and care market. The attendees are typically investors, bankers, insurance agencies and senior housing developers. Hundreds of business deals are made during the three days of the NIC conference. This year, there were 3,125 attendees, making it the largest conference in NIC history.

The first day of NIC officially began at noon, so that morning was dedicated to networking.  Lijun connected with Axel from Kisco Senior care, which we will be visiting one of their communities by the end of November to get more first-hand knowledge. Using LinkedIn as a tool, I broke the ice with two people from USI Insurance. Charlie and Richard answered questions regarding insurance coverage for senior care. Then I met with Dee Bangerter, CEO of Rocky Mountain Care. Dee is a long time senior housing developer who has been in this industry for almost 50 years. He shared insights on senior housing design and development, and key areas that make significant differences in clients’ experiences.

The NIC is a very well organized conference. The discussion panels consist of people who are true domain experts in different aspects of the senior housing and care industry. We attended a few sessions in the afternoon and found that the level of knowledge from the panelists was very professional and insightful. For the students who attended the conference through the scholarship program, NIC also held a networking session during a lunch gathering. Later in the evening, we attended a happy hour organized by NIC. Lijun spoke with attendees about the Rady School Lab to Market program, including Lisa Marsh Ryerson, who is the president of AARP Foundation and a speaker in the NIC talk program. I also had a great time talking with Bill Kauffman who is the Senior Principal of NIC and a panelist in the “What Is It Really Worth?” panel discussion.

The keynote speech on the second day was the highlight of the conference. Former chief economy advisor Gary Cohn was hosted by Steve Liesman from CNBC on the topic of macro economy and future outlook. Gary shared a wide spectrum of his wisdom and vision with a great sense of humor. He covered a variety of topics, including the market, trades, Trump administration economic policies, tax cuts, deficits, wages and more.

Lijun and I left NIC with a wealth of knowledge on the senior housing and care industry, as well as the market condition on senior housing investment.

The networking capacity of the conference connections built through this experience was well beyond our imagination and expectations. We really want to congratulate Chuck and the NIC organization for the great successful conference and appreciate the opportunity for the fantastic experience that we went through. The next NIC conference will take place in February 2019, right here in sunny San Diego.

Making the decision to pursue an MBA degree is no easy feat. There are a number of intricacies to consider before determining which program is worth the commitment. For Julian Ames (MBA ’20), his decision was made easy – it was a choice to continue his father’s legacy in his favorite city.

Originally from Washington D.C., Julian earned a psychology degree from the University of Vermont. After graduation, he worked as a youth counselor, personal trainer and in the sales and digital marketing sectors. While he found success in his position, he knew that in order to move up in his career, obtaining an MBA from a prestigious university was the logical next step.

“I decided to apply to a number of MBA programs because I wanted to have options, but I wasn’t sure what I really wanted,” he said. “I got accepted into a number of programs, such as Northeastern, Maryland and Pepperdine, but none of the programs stood out to me. I was looking for a program that could help me channel my interests and passions into a career, or help me start a company of my own.”

Whenever Julian sought advice, he turned to his father Brian. An accomplished entrepreneur and economist, Brian was a graduate of Harvard Business School who emphasized the importance of hard work and education in Julian’ life. Brian was born and raised in La Mesa, a city within San Diego’s city limits, and spent a number of summers visiting his beloved hometown with his family in tow for vacation. The first time Julian stepped onto the warm sands of Mission Beach, he pledged to find a way to return to San Diego for good.

Julian and Brian devised a plan to make that dream a reality – Brian would retire and pursue entrepreneurial efforts, and Julian would apply for the MBA program at the Rady School of Management.

In addition to its proximity to the beach, Julian was drawn to the Rady School for its unique approach to business school. Although the school presents opportunities for students to connect with top-tier companies, Julian appreciated the emphasis on innovation and entrepreneurship – traits his father asserted were imperative to his success in the business world.

In July of 2016, Brian was diagnosed with a glioblastoma brain tumor. Despite his uncertain future and a schedule jam-packed with doctor’s appointments, surgeries and treatment plans, Julian and Brian made the decision to soldier on with the plan.

And then the acceptance letter came – Julian was accepted into the Rady School of Management Full-Time MBA program.

“I remember that moment vividly — when I opened my acceptance letter, my dad was so pumped,” Julian said with a smile. “He was so excited for me, and he was also, in a way, pretty pompous – knowing that he had inspired me to do this, and seeing me follow through with goals I set for myself.”

Soon after Julian received his acceptance, Brian’s condition took a turn for the worse. Julian chose to defer his acceptance to the Rady School and leave work to spend time with Brian. Brian passed away on December 21, 2017.

“I can’t speak enough about how wonderful of a human being he was in all facets of life. He wasn’t just my father — he was my best friend,” Julian said. “He was my mentor in life and in business. He was extremely intelligent, outgoing and easy to get along with. A real bright light. We had always planned to drive across the country together and move out to San Diego, so to honor him, I followed through with our plan.”

Why Rady?

Confronting grief while pursuing an advanced degree is not an endeavor for the faint of heart, but Julian finds strength channeling his father’s spirit – in perseverance, determination and positivity.

Julian embraces his father in all aspects of his life, applying his work ethic to his schoolwork, jobs, fitness and entrepreneurial efforts. He looks to the advice – both solicited and unsolicited – that his father bestowed upon him in times of uncertainty and to find strength in facing challenges. But when asked about his decision to attend the Rady School of Management, Julian is confident he made the right choice. As he approached the midpoint of his first quarter, he reflected on the facets of Rady that attracted him to the school in the first place.

“If your goal is to be an entrepreneur, more focused on the startup experience, the Rady School is the perfect place,” he said. “If you’re aiming to secure a specific job title at a company you’ve had your eye on, Rady can help you with that as well.”

While Julian is interested in pursuing a number of career options – such as product development, large-scale marketing and even developing his own fitness resort — he is excited to explore the entrepreneurial opportunities, with prospective company ideas abound.

“I’m looking forward to getting involved with the StartR Accelerator, as well as Lab to Market because these entities can actually facilitate funding and guidance for your ventures,” he said. “These programs make Rady unique – there are several entities in place that are geared towards entrepreneurs and startups.”

To say Julian has hit the ground running would be an understatement. He has already leveraged the Rady Alumni Network, reaching out to alumni to connect with potential internship opportunities, is signing up for career fairs, making friends with his cohort and reaching out to faculty — all things he believes his Dad would have suggested.

“It’s definitely been a challenge, but when I let that ‘Brian Ames’ part of me come out, all good things happen — in relationships, in business, in all aspects of my life. ”

Bumpei Yoshida (MBA ’20) earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in chemical engineering from Kyoto University in Japan. He joined Sanyo Chemical Industries Ltd. in 2006. Before enrolling in the MBA program at the Rady School of Management, he served as a research and development unit chief for a Sanyo Chemical Industries Ltd. company-wide energy-business project.

1) Why did you choose to pursue an MBA?

I have been working for Sanyo Chemical Industries, Ltd. (SCI), a Japanese chemical manufacturer, for more than 10 years and have gained a lot of experience as a chemical engineer. However, in order to move up in my career, I feel it is important to learn more about high-level business procedures, such as planning and executing company strategies. I believe earning an MBA is the best way to accomplish this goal.

2) Why did you choose the Rady School?

I chose to attend the Rady School of Management because courses such as Lab to Market will help me understand technology commercialization. Through my career as an engineer, I have faced difficulties putting unique product ideas into the market, and these products were rarely successful. The Rady MBA program will provide me with a wealth of opportunities to learn how to manage such situations, as well as fundamental management skills and knowledge. Also, I am looking forward to collaborating with students at UC San Diego’s Jacobs School of Engineering.

3) What do you feel makes Rady unique? How do you benefit from these aspects?

I feel Rady’s small-size class is unique. The number of Full-Time MBA classmates is under 50. However, the backgrounds and nationality are still quite diverse. I believe this environment makes it easier to deepen the relationship between classmates, and allows us to learn more from each other. Moreover, Rady has energetic career support. They pay attention to each of us to help not only in searching for new employers but also in helping us establish meaningful networks for our future careers.

4) What classes are you looking forward to this year?

I am looking forward to participating in the Lab to Market sequence. Through my career, I have been trying to commercialize new chemical products with my company and have learned many things from my failures and a few successes. All these lessons are valuable to me, but the methodology and the way of thinking were always similar. I am eager to expand my knowledge with different kinds of concepts and methodologies for new product commercialization. I am excited to discuss my current business ideas with professors and classmates who have diverse professional backgrounds.

5) How has your perspective on your career or your life changed since you came to Rady?

Before I came to Rady, I rarely came across people who were interested in starting their own businesses. However, many Rady classmates and alumni are seeking the chance to start their own business by taking advantage of Rady’s strong and generous entrepreneurship support. I am happy with my current career and am not looking to switch jobs, but  I want to explore the opportunity to build a spin-off or a joint venture from SCI. Being a Rady student has encouraged me to explore a number of options that I normally may not have considered.

6) What are your goals after graduation?

As a company-sponsored student, my immediate goal after obtaining my MBA is to go back to Japan and to play a role as a strategist for SCI. Specifically, I will seek partnerships with device manufacturers to commercialize innovative technologies that have been developed in-house. My long-term goal is to secure a senior manager position in SCI’s planning division. Although SCI is steadily improving its performance, to sustain this growth into the future, it is essential to reinforce human resources capable of planning and executing company strategies from a global perspective. I want to become one of the key employees for SCI’s globalization.

Paul Wynns (MBA ’20) has been involved with aviation and aerospace throughout his entire life. His experience includes flying combat missions and managing aviation maintenance programs as a pilot in the U.S. Navy.  As a civilian, his career focused on new product prototyping for military aircraft, where he led teams in cultures and business environments, ranging from startups to the world’s largest aerospace company.

1) Why did you choose to pursue an MBA?

I’m enrolled as a Full-Time MBA candidate because the next steps of my career won’t come from technical credentials, awards or certifications. I need access to communities and networks where I can stretch my collaborative skills and find like-minded colleagues across a diversity of technical and life experience backgrounds. I’m excited to share and learn with the other entrepreneurs and professionals in my cohort, and the Full-Time program provides the perfect environment for collaboration and relationship building.

2) Why did you choose the Rady School?

Rady’s culture of innovation and collaboration resonates strongly with me. My first job after leaving the military was with a defense startup working out of a facility in the back of a strip mall. A few years and two acquisitions later I found myself working for the world’s largest aerospace company. My experience in military, large and small business cultures showed me that innovation comes from diverse points of view.

3) What do you feel makes Rady unique? How do you benefit from these aspects?

Rady’s relative newness as a school allows it to be agile, responsive and forward-leaning in its approach to the MBA programs. Its connections to the local San Diego startup ecosystem are full of exciting opportunities for insight, mentorship and venture capitalist funding. I’ve taken on a position as CEO and president of an aviation training startup, Flex Air, that’s just emerged from its first round of seed funding. I’m eager to apply the lessons and resources that Rady offers toward building my startup. With Rady’s help, I want to create the next generation of commercial and military pilots that will lead us into the second century of aviation.

4) What classes are you looking forward to this year?

I’m really looking forward to the MBA Quantitative Analysis class. My last lap through graduate studies was as an engineering student more than 20 years ago! In the intervening time, the accessibility of statistical and quantitative analysis tools has grown so significantly that they can be used by managers at all levels, not just specialists. It’s exciting to think that deeply powerful, analytical decision aids can be applied directly to my startup using open-source tools.

5) How has your perspective on your career or your life changed since you came to Rady?

I graduated with my master’s degree in engineering at the height of the dot-com craze in the late nineties. It was an exciting time, but I didn’t take the time to cultivate relationships and networks after I graduated. My military career kept me busy, but I’m sure there were missed opportunities. This time I want to focus more on the people that I meet instead of the skills that I’ll acquire. Even after just a few weeks at Rady with my cohort, and a few meetings with the school’s network of supporters and faculty, I’m confident that my new focus is the right one.

6) What are your goals after graduation?

Humanity is entering its second century of aviation, and at a time when commercial air travel demand is larger than ever, our labor supply of qualified pilots for aircraft of all types is very challenged. Recent reports from The Boeing Company have shown that the Asia Pacific region will need more than 240,000 new pilots, while 127,000 will be needed in the North American market. Meanwhile, existing pilot workforces are approaching FAA-mandated retirement ages here in the U.S. There’s huge demand for innovative, agile aviation training that energizes and recruits talent from the Millennial and Generation Z communities. At Flex Air, I’ll continue building a team of aviation professionals, student pilots and investors that will serve this market and create the next generation of aviators.

About the Company 

Solar Turbines is a $2 billion annual revenue-generating subsidiary of Caterpillar Inc. and is headquartered in San Diego. The company designs and manufactures gas turbines and compressors for oil and gas applications.   

The Process

I took Professor Hyoduk Shin’s Operations class (Management 413) and recognized the importance of supply chain management. He highlighted how Tim Cook – the CEO of Apple Inc. – is an operations guy, and that Amazon is successful because of its supply chain. Elon Musk even said, “The supply chain stuff is really tricky.” I felt supply chain was a good field to master. A few students from the 2018 Full-Time MBA cohort interned in the supply chain department at Solar Turbines the previous summer and spoke very highly of their experience. As a local company, Solar Turbines targets UC San Diego and Rady School students for its internship program. Rady Career Connections provided my resume to Solar Turbines for a supply chain internship, and I was very fortunate to receive an offer for the summer internship program.

The Project 

My manager, Jason Brown, leads the team responsible for ordering filter (air inlet filtration) parts, and saw that my electrical engineering and computer science background and MBA are a rare skillset, so he devised a new summer project that would capitalize on both skills. He identified that Solar Turbines needed a revamped product management tool to measure the Life-Cycle Cost of operating a Solar Turbines engine based on different filter mediums.

I was up for the challenge, so I decided to meet with technical leads and engineers and refined the vision of the new tool. After reading a few research papers about life-cycle cost, I found a more accurate model in a research paper authored by a Solar Turbines engineer and used it as a baseline. When I told the engineers what I aimed to make, they were in disbelief. One engineer asked, “When does your internship end? You’re going to make that in a month?” I boldly replied, “Yes. I will.” And I did it. When I started, I didn’t know Visual Basic. I learned the language and coded a seven-page UserForm to run accurate life-cycle cost simulations. The simulator does side-by-side cost comparisons to convince customers to choose one filter medium over another.

When I demonstrated the program to Solar Turbines executives, the reception was great. Senior principal engineers thanked me for the awesome work. My second level manager said it was fantastic. The Executive Sponsor of the Internship Program (the Director of Engineering) showed his gratitude, said it was the best implemented summer project and noted that it will be adopted by the company. Terra Saltzman-Baker, Director of Rady Career Connections, came to the presentation for support. Additionally, my product management professor at Rady, Vish Krishnan, stopped by the office to see a demo of the program as well. This internship was a remarkable experience, and I’m glad I could make an impact this summer.

The Experience

The internship was filled with many events hosted by the internship program coordinators, Ryan McKennon and Jericho Menvielle. We enjoyed campus tours, business unit overviews, professional mixers, an intern lunch, a happy hour and a summer BBQ. Work-life balance is an essential part of the Solar Turbines culture.

Joey Talia graduated from UC Berkeley with a degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS). He went on to work at Intel for over five years as a Circuit Designer and is now pursuing his MBA at UC San Diego – Rady School of Management (MBA ‘19). He is the president of the Rady Technology Club.