Dartmouth is establishing an Entrepreneurs Hall of Fame to honor exceptional alums who have demonstrated unparalleled entrepreneurial achievement over the course of their careers. Four alums will be the first named to the hall.
An initiative of Dartmouth’s Magnuson Center for Entrepreneurship, the Hall of Fame will recognize alums’ innovative thinking and impact on their industries and on society, says Jamie Coughlin, Magnuson’s executive director.
President Sian Leah Beilock says the new venture aims to motivate the next generation of students and faculty to pursue their entrepreneurial dreams with passion and purpose, no matter what their field of interest.
“Dartmouth has a strong history of entrepreneurially minded individuals, and with the Entrepreneurs Hall of Fame we’ll celebrate Dartmouth’s distinctive combination of innovation and impact in producing exceptional entrepreneurs,” says President Beilock.
The inaugural honorees are James Coulter ’82, Keith Dunleavy ’91, Steven Hafner ’91, and Shonda Rhimes ’91. Coulter and Hafner are to be inducted into the hall at a Sept. 7 ceremony at the Julia Morgan Ballroom in San Francisco, which Beilock will attend.
“The induction ceremony promises to be an evening of inspiration, insight, and celebration, uniting Dartmouth luminaries from the world of business, academia, and innovation,” Coughlin says. The event will be part of the annual Dartmouth Entrepreneurs Forum, which takes place every September in San Francisco.
The forum attracts hundreds of Dartmouth alumni, students, faculty, and staff from around the world, and this year marks the 10th year it has been held in San Francisco. The Sept. 8 Entrepreneurs Forum will feature Beilock and other speakers, panels, and discussion groups on topics including biosecurity, climate tech, and artificial intelligence.
Dunleavy and Rhimes are slated to be inducted at a ceremony in New York City on May 9. The May event will be followed by the annual spring forum, which traditionally takes place on the East Coast, on the Dartmouth campus, but because of the inaugural Entrepreneurs Hall of Fame will have a special showing in New York City.
“In its past, present and future, Dartmouth supports and contributes to professional pursuits with impact,” says Coughlin. “Our milestone events not only celebrate the achievements of these four exceptional individuals, they also serve as a catalyst for fostering a culture of entrepreneurship at Dartmouth. I am particularly pleased to note that our four Hall of Fame alums work across diverse industries—finance, technology, media and entertainment, and health care.”
The hall of famers were selected by a committee of the Magnuson advisory board.
“We are thrilled to induct these outstanding alumni into the hall,” says Jeff Crowe ’78, a Dartmouth trustee and chair of Magnuson’s Board of Advisors.
“These trailblazing individuals exemplify the spirit of entrepreneurship, embodying resilience, creativity, and leadership. Their journeys from Dartmouth to the pinnacles of success inspire aspiring entrepreneurs and ignite the entrepreneurial flame in each of us,” he says. “This is a big moment for Dartmouth, and we thank each of our inductees for their inspirational examples.”
Meet the inductees:
James Coulter ’82, co-founder and executive chairman of TPG
Coulter is executive chairman and founding partner of TPG, an alternative asset investment firm based in San Francisco and Fort Worth, Texas. TPG was founded in 1992 and today manages nearly $140 billion in assets, employs more than 1,100 professionals in 12 offices, and is a lead equity investor in more than 200 companies headquartered in over 20 countries.
Since the firm’s founding, Coulter and his partners have grown TPG from a traditional buyout firm to a multisector global alternative asset firm, scaling more than a dozen distinct investment strategies including impact investing, growth equity, real estate, Asia buyouts, life sciences, and more.
As well as his responsibilities as a control shareholder of TPG, Coulter today leads the firm’s industry-leading $18 billion Rise impact investing platform. In 2020 he was a driving force behind the conception and creation of the $7.3 Billion TPG Rise Climate Fund, the largest private equity fund focused on accelerating the clean energy transition.
Throughout his career, Coulter has served on more than 40 corporate boards and numerous charitable boards, including the boards of trustees of Dartmouth and Stanford University.
Keith Dunleavy ’91, founder, CEO, and director of Inovalon
Dunleavy, a physician, is the founder and CEO of Inovalon, a cloud-based health care software and data analytics company headquartered in Bowie, Md.
Driven by a desire to help empower a data-driven transformation of health care, Dunleavy has led Inovalon from its founding to its current industry-leading position utilizing advanced, cloud-based software platforms to empower improvements in clinical outcomes and economics for more than 20,000 health plan, hospital, provider system, pharmacy, and life sciences customers across the entire health care ecosystem. Uniquely designed to aggregate and leverage the industry’s largest connected primary-source health care dataset, Inovalon’s software and analytics are trained and informed by data pertaining to more than one million physicians, 640,000 clinical facilities, 372 million unique patients, and 78 billion medical events.
After founding the origins of Inovalon in 1998 while in residency at The Johns Hopkins Hospital, Dunleavy grew the company to become the nation’s largest pure-play health care SaaS and data analytics company, taking Inovalon public on the NASDAQ in 2015. In 2021 Inovalon was acquired by a consortium of investors led by Nordic Capital at an all-time stock price high for $7.3 billion.
Dunleavy received a bachelor’s degree in biology modified with engineering, with high honors, from Dartmouth. He earned his doctorate in medicine from Harvard Medical School, completed his medical residency at The Johns Hopkins Hospital, and practiced and was board certified in internal medicine.
Steve Hafner ’91, co-founder and CEO of Kayak
Hafner co-founded the travel search company Kayak, which was acquired by Booking Holdings in 2013 for $2.1 billion. He oversees the leadership team of OpenTable, Inc., a restaurant reservation platform. He co-founded online travel agency Orbitz, Inc. in 1999 and served on its executive team until its 2003 IPO for $1.3 billion. He serves on the board of Seatgeek, Inc., a live-events platform; the Fisher Island Community Association; and is a past board member of Trulia, Inc., Blade LLC, and several other startups.
Hafner received a BA in economics from Dartmouth in 1991 and an MBA from the Kellogg School at Northwestern University in 1997. He is the father of five daughters, including Wilson Hafner ’22.
Shonda Rhimes ’91, TV creator and producer, author, and founder and CEO of Shondaland
The award-winning CEO of a global media company, Rhimes is the first woman to create three television dramas—Grey’s Anatomy, Private Practice, and Scandal—that have achieved the 100-episode milestone. In 2017, she shifted the entertainment industry’s business model, leaving network television for an agreement to produce streaming content in partnership with Netflix.
Bridgerton, Shondaland’s first scripted series with the streamer, has become a worldwide franchise, with seasons of Bridgerton as well as the prequel series Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story currently holding three of the 10 top spots among English language programming for Netflix. Rhimes broadened her company’s content landscape, launching the culture website Shondaland.com in partnership with Hearst Digital Media and Shondaland Audio to produce podcasts content in partnership with iHeartRadio.
She is a New York Times bestselling author for her memoir, Year of Yes, and has built partnerships with such leading brands as Dove, St. John, Masterclass, Microsoft, and Mattel. She has been on the TIME 100 list of most influential people three times and her work has been celebrated with numerous awards including induction into the Television Academy Hall of Fame.
A Dartmouth trustee, Rhimes received her BA in English literature and creative writing at Dartmouth and has an MFA from the University of Southern California’s School of Cinematic Arts.
For information on the Dartmouth Entrepreneurs Hall of Fame or the Dartmouth Entrepreneurs Forum, email magnuson@dartmouth.edu.
