SUNY Poly hire
Grose will oversee institute’s economic development, research
Doug Grose, new head of economic development, introduced to board.
Doug Grose attended his first board meetings of the two entities that oversee the research and economic development operations at SUNY Polytechnic Institute on Monday.
And Robert Megna couldn’t have been more pleased.
“There is no one happier in the state of New York than me that Doug has agreed to join us,” Megna said as a way of introduction to the board of Fuller Road Management Corp., one of two nonprofits that lease space at SUNY Poly and oversee the school’s business partnerships. “There is no one more qualified than Doug.”
For the past year and a half, Megna, the former state budget director who now works for SUNY, has been overseeing Fuller Road Management and another entity called Fort Schuyler Management Corp. in the post-alain Kaloyeros era.
But in recent weeks, Grose, the former CEO of Globalfoundries, was hired by the Research Foundation for SUNY to oversee the two entities and eventually a newly created entity, called NY CREATES, that will merge their functions.
Grose, a graduate of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, grew up in the Mohawk Valley and worked for most of his career with IBM in the Hudson Valley.
Grose also spent time from 2003 to 2004 as chief administrative officer of Albany Nanotech, the predecessor to SUNY Poly back when it was part of the University at Albany.
Megna took over SUNY Poly’s economic development programs as part of Empire State Development, the state’s economic development arm, assuming control of them in the wake of the departure of SUNY Poly founder Kaloyeros, who is facing a federal bid-rigging trial next month in Manhattan. Kaloyeros has pleaded not guilty.
Grose will oversee only the economic development and corporate research side of SUNY Poly, which has a campus in Albany and one in Utica.
The academic side of the school, which Kaloyeros also created, is likely to face changes at some point, although SUNY
officials have not unveiled those plans yet. Binghamton University’s Bahgat Sammakia, himself a former IBMER, has been leading SUNY Poly since late 2016 as interim president but is not taking the job permanently and will eventually return to Binghamton.
SUNY Chancellor Kristina Johnson is scheduled to visit SUNY Poly on Tuesday afternoon to meet with faculty and staff and talk about the future of the academic side of the school, although it is unclear what she plans to say about those plans.
SUNY Poly offers degrees in nanoscale science and engineering
in Albany and a wide variety of science, medical and technical degrees in Utica, which operates much more like a traditional college compared with Albany, which has no dorms or typical college lifestyle programs.
Megna stressed at Monday’s meeting in Albany that Grose was hired to manage economic development and work with SUNY Poly’s corporate research and development programs in Albany and across the state.
“The academic piece is still under discussion,” Megna said. “And I’m sure the chancellor will have some announcements to make in the near future. We expect that Doug and whoever comes as interim president to SUNY Poly will work as partners together to keep this moving forward.”