Named for its founders, William “Bill” Bradford and Alfred “Al” Osborne Jr. who, over their 40+ year careers, have published more than 60 research articles. Their funding of this award is yet another of their many innovations.
Bill Bradford (left) and Al Osborne (right)
Bill is an Emeritus Dean and Emeritus Professor of the University of Washington’s Foster School of Business. Al is the founder and faculty director of the Harold and Pauline Price Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation at the UCLA Anderson School of Management where he is also a Professor of Global Economics, Management, and Entrepreneurship. In addition to recognizing groundbreaking research, the award seeks to stimulate additional research, provide public and corporate policy makers with insights to guide decision-making, and equip business support organizations to deliver impactful programming.
This award is carefully curated and administered by UW Foster Consulting and Business Development Center.
2026 Award Ceremony
The award will be presented on April 10, 2026, at the University of Washington Foster School of Business in Seattle, WA.
Previous Award Winners
2026 Minimum Viable Signal: Venture Funding, Social Movements, and Race by Professor Qian Wang, Matt Marx, and Emmanuel Yimfor
2025 Lender Automation and Racial Disparities in Credit Access by Professor Sabrina T. Howell, Theresa Kuchler, David Snitkof, Johannes Stroebel, Jun Wong
2024 Revealing and Mitigating Racial Bias and Discrimination in Financial Services by Sterling Bone, Glenn Christensen, Anneliese Lederer, Martin Mende, Brandon G. Christensen, and Marina Cozac.
2023 Can FinTech reduce disparities in access to finance? Evidence from the paycheck protection program by Professor Isil Erel and Jack Liebersohn
2022 Black and White: Access to Capital Among Minority-Owned Start-ups by
Robert Fairlie, Alicia Robb, and David T. Robinson
2021 The Impact of COVID-19 on Small Business Owners: The First Three Months after Social-Distancing Restrictions by Robert Fairlie
2020 The Colorblind Crowd? Founder Race and Performance in Crowdfunding by
Peter Younkin and Venkat Kuppuswamy
Lifetime Leadership Award
Timothy Bates
Distinguished Professor of Economics, Wayne State University (ret.)
Since 1973, Tim has published nearly 100 peer-reviewed articles, 30 articles in the business and popular press, and five books on issues related to entrepreneurs of color. Before teaching at Wayne State, he was Chair of the Urban Policy Analysis graduate programs and Professor of Urban Policy Analysis at the New School for Social Research, and Chair of the Department of Economics at the University of Vermont. He has also taught at UNC-Chapel Hill, UC Berkeley, and UCLA. He received his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Wisconsin.
Contact
Wil Tutol | [email protected]