2. Introduction
• E52 was constructed in 1938 as the Massachusetts headquarters for the Lever Brothers
soap company.
• Renovations began in 2013 and after two and half years, the renovation project is
complete, and the building was officially dedicated on March 3, 2016.
• The goals of the renovation were to:
o Restore and reinvigorate one of MIT’s architectural treasures
o Centralize the programmatic offices of MIT Sloan School of Management and
better connect them to their academic activities
o Provide a headquarters for MIT’s Department of Economics
o Create a much-needed, versatile conference center for the use of the entire MIT
community
4. • The original Sloan building, now called the Morris and Sophie Chang Building, is named
after Morris Chang, SB ’52, SM ’53, ME ’55 and Sophie Chang.
• Dr. Morris Chang, the founder of the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company
(TSMC), is a well-known leader of the international semiconductor industry.
• He studied and worked in the U.S. for 36 years and earned his bachelor‘s and
master’s degrees from MIT, both in mechanical engineering, and a PhD in electrical
engineering from Stanford University.
• Dr. Chang also serves on the MIT Sloan Asian Executive Board and is a past member of
the Visiting Committees for Economics and Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.
• Sophie Chang is an artist and the director of the TSMC Foundation’s Volunteer Society;
she painted the portrait of the couple at the lobby entrance.
• She leads employee volunteers in a variety of educational, cultural, and emergency
initiatives that serve society.
6. • The building’s architect Beyer Blinder Belle is also known for restoring the Empire State
Building.
• The building’s exterior façade on Memorial Drive was scrubbed and restored, and all of
the windows were replaced.
• The new layout centers around the two-story lobby with a new open staircase leading
from the first to the third floor, and additional elevator capacity.
• This new layout creates a welcoming atmosphere while maximizing natural daylight and
energy efficiency.
• The building was re-designed with a nod to the Art Deco style that characterized the
original building.
• It has interior bridges that connect to buildings E51, E53, E62, and beyond to E40 and
E60, which provide a seamless route from one side of Sloan’s campus to the other.
• There is one MIT classroom on the lobby level that is now larger, with more
technology.
• The painted murals that lined the walls prior to renovation were images of Cambridge,
including Harvard, that were made for Lever Brothers.
• The murals took 2-3 months to peel off and are now stored by the MIT Museum.
8. • The north vestibule of the building off Shames Plaza spotlights an MIT Percent-for-Art
piece designed by artist Leo Villareal.
• Most recently, Villareal created the temporary Bay Lights on the San Francisco Bay
Bridge, and people loved it so much, it remains a permanent art piece on the bridge.
• The light sculpture is composed of 240 hanging LED rods, arranged from the ceiling of
the building.
• Each rod is approximately nine feet tall and consists of 72 individual LEDs.
• These rods are held in place by a steel “canopy,” a structural support matching the
ceiling’s color and providing electrical distribution to the rods.
• The sculpture is controlled by an unhackable software code developed by Villareal; the
LEDs cycle through a randomly generated series of combinations and sequences.
• Villareal has shared that throughout his career, he has been continually inspired by the
powerful ideas and extraordinary people associated with MIT.
10. • E52 has become a one-stop-shop, which features student-facing administrative suites
structured for ease of interaction between students and administrators.
• The new design allows its users to optimize their time, while increasing the chance of
fruitful spontaneous encounters.
• Lower Level: Sloan Technology Services and MIT Copytech are located in the lower
level along with student lockers.
• First Floor: The Student Life Office, Sloan Educational Services, the Undergraduate and
PhD Program Offices, and the Facilities and Space Planning Office are on the first floor.
• Second Floor: The second floor is home to the MBA, Master of Finance, MSMS, Sloan
Fellows, and Executive MBA program offices, and the MIT Leadership Center. Also on the
second floor is a historic Alfred P. Sloan conference table and chairs.
• Third Floor: MIT Sloan Admissions is housed in the Hans Lin, MBA ‘98 and Tatiana
Andrade Admissions Suite, and the Action Learning offices are on the third floor, shared by
the Economics headquarters. Additionally, there are eight new student study rooms on the
third floor.
12. • The MIT Department of Economics is located on the fourth and fifth floors.
• The new structure brings faculty together by concentrating faculty offices on two floors
and offering a new capacity to host distinguished visiting faculty.
• It also now has more spaces for students to study and do research in various seminar and
study rooms throughout the two floors.
14. • The Samberg Conference Center has replaced the former MIT Faculty Club.
• It encompasses the sixth and seventh floors.
• The sixth floor preserved the mantelpieces from the former Faculty Club’s historic dining
rooms, incorporating them into two sophisticated river-view venues.
• The top floor is a new 20,000 foot glass-encased addition, which doubles the original
capacity and fulfills the Institute’s acute need for an on-campus conference center.
• When building the 7th floor, a temporary “roof” was built on the 6th floor so they could
build up and down at the same time. This added 2 feet to the ceiling of the 6th floor and
the full 7th floor and balcony.
• With a total of 11 spaces, the Samberg Conference Center offers a variety of meeting
room arrangements for groups of 10 to 500.
16. • The new Samberg Conference Center is named after Arthur Samberg, SB ’62 and
Rebecca Samberg.
• Arthur Samberg is a life member of the MIT Corporation and was the chairman, CEO,
and managing director of Pequot Capital Management.
• Pequot Capital Management was a multi-billion dollar hedge fund sponsor founded in
1998 and closed in 2010.
• Before Arthur started his finance career, he was an aerospace engineer at Lockheed
Martin, where he developed guidance and control technologies for missile systems.
• Arthur and Rebecca have been part of the Institute community for decades.
• Arthur holds a bachelor’s degree in aeronautics and astronautics from MIT, a master’s
also in aeronautics and astronautics from Standford University, and an MBA from Columbia
Business School.
• He chaired the MIT Investment Management Company Board for five years and served
on the MIT Executive Committee.
• Currently, Arthur serves on the External Advisory Board of the MIT Energy Initiative and is
a member of the Visiting Committees for Aeronautics and Astronautics, Civil and
Environmental Engineering, Mathematics, and Nuclear Engineering.
