Shai Bernstein is an expert in entrepreneurship, private equity, and venture capital (VC). Professor Bernstein analyzes financial issues arising in start-ups and high-growth firms and evaluates how those issues interact with innovation and entrepreneurial activity. He has substantial corporate finance, securities, and valuation expertise.
As an expert witness, Professor Bernstein has submitted reports for litigation involving the customs of VC and private equity firms. He has also testified at trial.
In his research, Professor Bernstein focuses on topics related to entrepreneurship, start-ups, and public and private equity. In these contexts, he has calculated business losses, asset allocations, and talent flows connected to bankruptcies, economic downturns, buyouts, and recessions.
Professor Bernstein has published his research in the Journal of Finance, the Journal of Applied Corporate Finance, and the Journal of Economic Perspectives, among others. He is associate editor at the Journal of Financial Economics and Management Science. Both the Journal of Finance and the Western Finance Association have honored him with best paper awards for articles on corporate finance subjects.
At Harvard Business School, Professor Bernstein teaches M.B.A., Ph.D., and executive education courses on entrepreneurial finance, launching new ventures, and private equity and VC. Previously, he served on the faculty at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, and also taught business leadership and innovation as part of Stanford’s Seed Transformation Program in Africa and Stanford Ignite in London.
Professor Bernstein speaks at academic and professional conferences in the United States and internationally. He serves as a faculty research fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), where he is part of NBER’s programs on Corporate Finance, and Productivity, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship. In addition, he is a faculty fellow at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR).