Maha Krishnamurthy, Ph.D., MBA, is the President and CEO of the University of Tennessee Research Foundation. She oversees all aspects of the UT Research Foundation, including both technology transfer offices (the Knoxville Office and the Memphis Office) and their staff. These offices are responsible for commercializing UT’s innovations, promoting an entrepreneurial culture, and assisting UT in growing its research. Maha also manages UTRF’s $5M Accelerate Venture Fund, UT Ventures and oversees UTRF’s subsidiary companies that are established to support the research and economic development mission of the University of Tennessee.
Before joining UTRF in 2011, Maha served as an intellectual property commercialization consultant for Fuentek, LLC, and UT-Battelle and as a physics research associate and lecturer at UT Knoxville. Maha holds a bachelor’s degree from Saint Xavier College in India, a master’s in business administration from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and a Ph.D. in physics from Colorado State University.