UCLA alumnus stresses need for educational emphasis on technology

By Jaime Wilson-Chiru
Daily Bruin Contributor

Hundreds of people gathered on Wednesday to hear Henry Samueli
speak about how he went from working at his family’s liquor
store to being Chief Technical Officer of a multi-billion dollar
corporation.

“I came to find out what makes him unique,” said
Brian Tudor, a second-year neuroscience student. “How he
approaches life and how he approaches business is really
important.”

Samueli is a UCLA alumnus who founded Broadcom, a leading
communications technology company, while on hiatus as a UCLA
professor.

He recently donated $30 million to the UCLA School of
Engineering and Applied Science, which will be renamed in his
honor. Samueli will be the keynote speaker at the school’s
commencement ceremony in June.

Samueli spoke in Moore 100 about his first experience with
electrical devices in the seventh grade. His electric-shop
instructor did not think he could build a short-wave radio that
worked, but he did.

“That point changed my life. I was on a mission to find
out how radios work,” Samueli said.

He emphasized that students should not look for jobs that pay
well, but they should do something they truly enjoy.

“Follow your heart, and you will be successful,” he
said.

In 1971 Samueli enrolled in UCLA at the age of 16 and earned his
masters, and doctoral degrees in electrical engineering by
1980.

“I would not be where I am today if it were not for my
education,” Samueli said. “I owe 100 percent of my
success to that. Education is what is going to raise the standard
of living for people in this country.”

He said he hoped that his donation would help encourage students
to pursue higher degrees in technology and enjoy similar
success.

“If you want to be on the top tier, you have to have an
advanced degree,” he said. “I’m hoping the next
50 Broadcoms will be created by UCLA students because of the
donation.”

After working in the Electronics Technology division of TRW, he
returned to UCLA in 1985 as a faculty member in the electrical
engineering department.

“TRW promoted me several times and offered me a managerial
position. But I took a 50 percent pay cut to leave TRW and teach
full time at UCLA,” Samueli said.

Then in 1991, he and Henry Nicholas III founded Broadcom with
the vision of making products that would enable the high-speed
transmission of data. He took a leave of absence from the
university in 1995 to concentrate on the company.

Today, Broadcom is a leading provider of silicon solutions that
allow high-speed digital transmission of voice, data and video
content.

“I never ever planned on being an entrepreneur, but it was
a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” Samueli said.

He said he wants to maintain his company’s success by
hiring only the best workers.

“We try to maintain a culture of elite engineers,”
he said. “UCLA is, by far, the No. 1 source of employees for
Broadcom.”

Currently, Broadcom has 100 UCLA graduates working on the staff.
But, Samueli said that there are not enough skilled engineers in
California.

“We have such a red-hot economy with such opportunities.
People are looking to hire, but there is a huge shortage of quality
high-tech talent,” he said.

After his talk, Samueli gave a brief presentation on how his
company is at the forefront of the Internet revolution. He gave
examples of electronic devices, from refrigerators to televisions,
that will be connected to the Internet.

“Over the next 20 years, virtually every electronic device
will be connected to a network,” Samueli said.

Samueli wrapped up his lecture by answering questions from the
audience, which included students, professors and others interested
in technology.

The lecture was facilitated by the Association for Careers in
Technology, a student-run group focussed on informing students of
job opportunities in the field of technology.

“Hopefully people learned something,” said Jason
Chou, co-president of ACT. “If he isn’t a great role
model for electrical engineering students, I don’t know who
is.”