About Us

The Beyster Institute at UC San Diego’s Rady School of Management works to advance the understanding and practice of employee ownership as an effective and responsible business model.

We focus on education, research and consulting to promote employee ownership and the creation of effective ownership cultures.

The work of the Beyster Institute began in 1986 when, as part of the Foundation for Enterprise Development, it took on the commission to spread the visionary ideas of Dr. J. Robert Beyster, the founder of SAIC. These ideas have led to the development of many highly successful enterprises based on the potent combination of employee ownership and entrepreneurial spirit.

Dr. Beyster founded SAIC in 1969, and by the time he retired from the company in 2004 it had grown to Fortune 500® size, with more than 40,000 employees and annual revenues approaching $8 billion. Dr. Beyster firmly believed that the methods used to develop SAIC – employee ownership, shared entrepreneurship and participation – can make a real difference in the success of an enterprise and in the economic lives of people everywhere. From the very beginning, Dr. Beyster rewarded the performance of employees with stock ownership. As SAIC grew, Dr. Beyster fought to preserve the values that had made the early SAIC successful – not only employee ownership and entrepreneurship, but a flexible and decentralized organization structure, technical excellence, high standards of ethical conduct, and a firm belief in customer service.

Dr. Beyster retired from the company in 2004. In conjunction with his retirement the Beyster Institute joined the Rady School of Management at the University of California, San Diego, a leading professional school within one of the top-ranked institutions in the U.S. for higher education and research.  Dr. Beyster passed away at his home in La Jolla on Dec. 22, 2014, leaving behind a legacy that continues to have a lasting impact on people, businesses, and communities across the face of our nation and around the globe.