Benoît Leleux is the Stephan Schmidheiny Professor of Entrepreneurship and Finance at IMD (International Institute for Management Development) in Lausanne, Switzerland where he directs entrepreneurship and innovation related programs. He was director of Research and Development and Director of the MBA Program. Previously he was Visiting Professor of Entrepreneurship at INSEAD and Director of the 3i VentureLab as well as Associate Professor and Zubillaga Chair in Finance and Entrepreneurship at Babson College, Wellesley, MA (USA) from 1994 to 1999. He obtained his PhD at INSEAD, specializing in Corporate Finance and Venture Capital.
Dr. Leleux is a specialist in venture finance, including areas such as entrepreneurship, venture capital, private equity and growth management, with a strong interest in family business (he has been the director of the IMD-Lombard Odier Global Family Business Award since 2008). His experience includes four years of corporate venturing in South East Asia for a major agribusiness conglomerate. He is active in a number of venture capital and private equity funds, as well as a dozen startup companies in Europe and the US, as either director, investor, and/or advisor.
Recent research papers look at equity-for-service arrangements, the effects of public interventions in venture capital markets in Europe, the role of personal bankruptcy legislations on entrepreneurial startups, and corporate venturing and venture capital programs. He is recognized as a leading specialist in entrepreneurship, venture capital, private equity and corporate venturing, with a strong interest in family business (he has been the director of the IMD-Lombard Odier Global Family Business Award since 2008).
He publishes regularly and his books include “Winning Sustainability Strategies” with Jan van der Kaaij (Link, 2019), “Private Equity 4.0” (Wiley, 2015), “Investing Private Capital in Emerging and Frontier Market SMEs” (IFC, 2009), “Nurturing Science-Based Startups: An International Case Perspective” (Springer Verlag, 2008) and “From Microfinance to Small Business Finance: The Business Case for Private Capital Investments” (Palgrave McMillan, 2007). He also authored “A European Casebook on Entrepreneurship and New Ventures”(Prentice Hall, 1996) with David Molian. He holds a MSc in Agricultural Engineering, an MA in Education from the Université Catholique de Louvain (Belgium), and an MBA from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. He was a Fellow of the Sasakawa Young Leaders Program in Japan and the College for Advanced Studies in Management (CIM) in Brussels.
Benoît Leleux’ works have earned some distinguished awards, including the 1996 Best Paper Award in International Finance at the FMA conference in New York, and the 1996 Best Paper Award at the Academy of Entrepreneurial Finance. His teaching cases have won more than twenty EFMD and ECCH European Case Awards and he has been running executive educations programs for more than 50 leading global corporations.
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