Valentin P. Gapontsev, PhD, founder, chairman and CEO of IPG Photonics Corp., an Oxford, Mass., fiber laser company, won Ernst & Young's Entrepreneur of the Year Award in the industrial products and services category for New England, at the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year 20th anniversary gala held last month in Boston. In 1990, Gapontsev founded IPG, where he pioneered the development of a proprietary all-fiber technology platform for fiber lasers and amplifiers and commercialized numerous products. He has a PhD in physics from the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology and received an honorary doctorate of science from Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, Mass.