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About Jack
Jack's Career Story
After returning from the Peace Corps with just $200, Jack worked his way up from his first job at Becton Dickinson Medical Systems to EVP during a corporate exit. He took on the CEO role after the acquisition, growing and selling the company 4 years later to Litton Industries Medical Systems, where he became President, and eventually left the medtech industry after 17 years.
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As an avid skier and snowboarder, Jack had the pleasure of working for CB Vaughn, the larger-than-life extraordinary founder of CB Sports, the then leading ski apparel brand. This opportunity provided firsthand insight into the workings of a real entrepreneur and working with senior industry leaders. CB Sports was sold and Jack moved back to Boston, and tt was at that he created Derby Management - a management consulting firm specializing in strategy and business planning with deep expertise in Sales and Marketing productivity.
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Along the Jack has continued his work as a passionate entrepreneur. Some highlights include:
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Founded/co-founded 9 startups, mostly in tech or in healthcare
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Involved with 54 deals raising $840 million (as an entrepreneur, investor, and advisor)
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Teaching entrepreneurship at Tufts and coaching the University's startups
The Derby Center at Tufts
The Derby Entrepreneurship Center at Tufts (DEC) is was founded to develop Tufts University students, faculty, staff, alumni, and community in entrepreneurship through our undergraduate academics, hands-on learning experiences, and equity-free funding through competitions, prizes, internships and awards.
Jack's Legacy at Tufts
Jack is the professor of the practice and founder of Tufts' Derby Entrepreneurship Center (DEC).
In July 2021, Jack and his wife, Jan Olmstead, donated $10 million to Tufts. The gift created a $9 million endowment that named the Entrepreneurship Center and provided an additional $1 million for the Joyce Cummings Center atrium, Tufts’ new multidisciplinary academic building which houses the Derby Entrepreneurship Center.
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Jack's desire to found an entrepreneurship center is deeply rooted in his family's background of business and innovation. Growing up in a family involved in local entrepreneurship—from his father's jazz band, his grandfather's jewelry stores, and his great-grandfather's dry goods store—he experienced the essence of street-level entrepreneurship firsthand.