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August Petersen
Senior Lecturer
The
Office: ECJ 5.440 |
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August Petersen has been a senior partner, officer, board member,
investor and consultant to numerous Texas business ventures for over 25
years. In addition, he is a faculty member at the University of Texas,
where he has taught more than one hundred undergraduate and MBA courses
classes in Accounting, Corporate and Real Estate Finance as well as
Strategic Management. He jointly serves on the faculty of UT’s Institute
of Commercial Capitalism and the UT School of Engineering where he has
developed and taught courses on entrepreneurship and technology
commercialization. Raised and educated in New Jersey, August attended East Central University in Oklahoma on an athletic scholarship. After taking an active role in several student organizations, he was elected Student Senate President for two consecutive years. Majoring in Accounting and Business Administration, he graduated with honors, after being selected the University's Outstanding Student and the Business School's Most Distinguished Graduate. He has served as a trustee on the East Central’s Foundation. August moved to Austin to attend the University of Texas and earned his Master of Professional Accountancy degree with highest honors. Upon completing his Masters, he joined the Austin office of the international accounting firm, Touche Ross. In addition to his client responsibilities, he served as a coordinator of professional staff recruitment and participated in the firm's successful business development efforts. He left public accounting to become a founding partner of The Watson Group, a Texas partnership that became the largest diversified real estate firm in Austin. Mr. Petersen had senior management responsibilities for over fifty real estate business entities, development projects and investment properties, the scope of which exceeded several hundred million dollars. These projects included one of the nation's largest historical rehabilitations, Central Texas' largest new constructions of commercial, retail and industrial office space, as well as several thousand acres of land developments. The Watson Group partners also served as the advisors for two of Austin's most successful economic development efforts: the MCC computer research consortium and the Austin division of 3M Corporation. Mr. Petersen later became the Managing Partner of Petersen-Watson Interests to focus on long-term land investment and development opportunities. | A licensed CPA and real estate broker, August has lectured at state, national and international professional conferences and seminars. He currently chairs a series of national accounting conferences for the software industry. He was a founding officer and a contributing editor for the Austin Business Journal. He has served as an officer and board member for the Better Business Bureau, the Urban League, United Way, the American Cancer Society, the Volunteer Center and Leadership Austin. His professional and civic involvement led to his selection as a National Finalist in the White House Fellowship program. He has been named as one of the Outstanding Young Men of America, selected to Who's Who in American Finance and Emerging Leaders of America. He is married, the father of two boys, and is a founding member of St. John Neumann Catholic Church. | |
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