Holy s**t
, this guy is ON FIRE!:biggrin:
It goes like this:
At the time when Martin/Steve Cross/I were atUIUC was the 2nd ranked Engineering Univ, tied w/Stanford..MIT ranked #1. It ATTRACTS the top talent, who have big egos & ambition. Steve Cross was from Air Force, his high Academics were recognized & thus he was sent to UIUC for further development. He became the Head of CMU's SEI/Software Engineering Institute, ONR/Office of Naval Research Program Manager, then finally VP of Georgia-Tech & President of GTRI. I am NOT surprised that Steve & Martin became leaders in their respective fields, that's the whole purpose of elite Universities:
"recruiting Top Talent, & Developing them"
Another guy in the same office in '83 (a couple years after Martin was there in '81), was Steve Blostein.
[ he is now Prof of Electrical Eng at Queens Univ (Harvard of the North), the alma mater for Justine Musk (English major, who is now a famous novelist). Where Elon Musk & Justine met. Steve married my other officemate Dr. Dorothea Haken (prof of Computer Science @Queens U.), her father Wolfgang got famous for the computer proof of the 4-color Theorem with Dr. Kenneth Appel (his son Andrew is Prof of Computer Science @Princeton, & Dept Head, Andrew & I went to the same infamous High School), her grandfather was Max Planck's PhD student. ]
His Dad was the Head of Bell Northern Research (Bell Labs of Canada). I.e., my PhD advisor (famous MIT PhD, pioneer in Image Coding) attracted the son of a leading R&D Institution. And, another guy was William Ho (good friends with Rod Fletcher, the guy who designed the High Speed Image Buffer, Martin was wirewrapping a board for). His dad (Irving Ho) RAN the whole Technology Park in Taiwan!! You will note that Tesla Roadster's electric motor is made in Taiwan. My other office-mate Homer Chen became Professor of Electrical Eng @NTU (National Taiwan Univ), "Irving Ho Chair professor". I met Homer for the 1st time in 24 years at last years SIGGRAPH 2008:
His student had a paper at this prestigous conference, which hosts developers/researchers for the lucrative Computer Gaming & Special Effects in TV/Film (the latter is the domain of Loren Carpenter/PIXAR, Tesla Roadster owner)
Another guy, Ken T. (Class of '78/UIUC Elec Eng, I'm Class of '79 BS Elec Eng) went on to lead the QTVR group @Apple. He is now at Google (working on the Streetview VR functionality of Google Maps). He is a Computer Graphics Legend, I met him last year at SIGGRAPH 2008:
Ken is a math whiz (very deep guy), & gets invites to Stanford & MIT for talks, given his pioneering work in VR. He's an Icon, like Martin is.
Bottomline:
Martin should be tapping into some of his old UIUC alumni (incl me), for some future Projects. You will note that his trusted friend M. Tarpening (Berkeley grad) was a co-founder of Tesla.
At the time, some of the Elec Eng faculty considered UIUC to be #1: quality & quantity. The hot thing, was to get an MBA along with your Engineering degree, & then go out in the Real World & kick some a**. You saw how Martin Eberhard did JUST THAT, as he became a serial entrepeneur.
BTW, another guy was Marc Andreesen of NCSA Mosaic fame (he came along after Martin & I left UIUC, in the late 80's when NCSA started up), the co-founder of Netscape.
[ the founder of the NCSA/National Ctr for Supercomputing Applications was Dr. Larry Smarr, a computational Astrophysicist. He needed supercomputers for his work (galaxy simulations). BTW, he visited the AARG/Advanced Automation Research Group, where Martin & I worked, to check out our state-of-the-art GE CCD cameras (connected to the High Speed Image Buffer (designed by Rod Fletcher), the card which was wire-wrapped by Martin). Dr. Smarr became a Tech icon, & moved on to UC San Diego/CALIT2 (
Calit2 : California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology). CALIT2 is involved with Communications Technology, with some activity in Automotive. Their Industrial Partners include Ford, Mitsubishi, Toyota, Nissan. Hmm. Hint Hint, "future EVs will require Smart Communications Tech". I can be the go-between to put Martin in touch with Dr. Smarr/CALIT2. Remember, Media/Communications was Martin's specialty (Nuvomedia) before he co-founded Tesla Motors. Larry Smarr's son Joseph is a Stanford M.S. Computer Science grad, & also went to the same high-school I did. Dr. Andrew Chien
(the mischievious one, now Intel Director of Research & VP of Corporate Technology, who squired Martin w/water while Martin was wire-wrapping a PC board)
also went to this University High School, which produced 3 Nobel Laureates: Physics '77, Economics '82, Medicine 'xx) ]
He just started his own VC firm Boutique this year, initiallly capitalized at 300 million.
Marc Andreessen Forms Boutique Venture Capital Firm | Epicenter | Wired.com
Marc Andreessen and business partner Ben Horowitz launched a boutique VC fund Monday with an initial capitalization of $300 million that the pair intends to invest in “anything that involves chips and computers” at a clip of $50,000 to $50 million per startup.
The firm, Andreessen / Horowitz, makes a business of what has been a consuming private enterprise of the two, who have made angel investments all over Silicon Alley. While the money they have at their disposal now is considerably more than they had as lone private investors their approach will remain essentially the same, Andreessen and Horowitz told Wired at a recent briefing. That is to say, they they won’t invest in anything they don’t understand, period. This includes a lot of “cool stuff,” the eternally-boyish Andreessen explains, like clean and nano technology.
If you get to make a pitch a decision won’t be long in coming because it’s only the two partners deciding. But don’t bother to cold e-mail them with your Google-killing idea. You need an invitation to this party — a referral from somebody you both know and that they respect
Marc & I had the same undergrad boss, Ginny Metze..the wife of Dr. Gernot Metze (specialty is FTC/Fault Tolerant Computing), a UIUC Electrical Eng professor. He was also at the Interdisciplinary outfit CSL/Coordinated Science Laboratory (where Martin & I were officemates), mostly Electrical Engineers, some Computer Scientists, some Physicists. The Director was Dr. Robert Chien (also an Electrical Eng prof, Martin's supervisor), whose son Andrew is now Intel Director of Research & Vice-President of Corporate Technology.
Back to Ginny Metze, she was working in the CFD/Computational Fluid Dynamics group at CSL/Coordinated Science Laboratory (3rd floor, Martin/Steve/me were on the 2nd floor), where my father was part of that group in the 60's. It was led by Dr. Bruce Hicks
[ Caltech PhD, Linus Pauling's PhD student..the 2-time Nobelist in Chemistry & Peace. LP was a GIANT in Physics
"anything he wanted to do..HE COULD DO IT"
-- James Watson, Nobelist (discovered "double helix" with Frances Crick)
another example of a Caltech alumni coming into UIUC ]
Ginny moved on the Materials Research Laboratory (next to the Physics Bldg, aka Loomis Laboratory of Physics, where Martin gave his Sept/2008 talk "Doing something Worthwhile"). Her office was just down the hall from the legendary Dr. Stephen Wolfram, the Caltech GENIUS PhD (he got it at a few weeks into age 20, almost got it as a teen-ager). My Dad (because of his extensive Caltech contact, especially Dr. Hicks his mentor), was on the search committee that lured S. Wolfram from Princeton IAS/Institute for Advanced Study
( where he ended up, after he left Caltech on bad terms..Caltech was trying to mooch off his entrepeneurial activity @Caltech, the pre-cursor to his Mathematica work ).
S. Wolfram ran into the same problem @UIUC, like he did @Caltech, the Corporate Mono-Culture of Academia couldn't contain "his immense mind".
[ this is reminiscent of how the mono-culture at Tesla Motors..led by you-know-who..couldn't contain the "immense mind" of Martin Eberhard or Wally Rippel..Caltech genius who learned from the legendary Dr. Richard Feynman/Caltech Physics/Nobelist, see Tesla Motors blog post "Richard Feynman, a Curious Character". Both Martin & Wally were part of that Stealth Bloodbath, as was Judy Estrin..she resigned from the Tesla Board shortly thereafter ]
S. Wolfram went on to found Wolfram Research (a co-founder Theodore Gray is an alumni of my High School, University High School on UIUC campus, just 1 block away from CSL/Coordinated Science Laboratory, where Martin/Steve Cross/I worked at), the rest as they say is history.
Lesson Learned:
"Life is 20% What happens to you, 80% HOW YOU RESPOND TO IT"
-- a wise man once said
"When 1 door closes [ leaving Tesla ], another one opens [ a new startup ]"
-- Spanish Proverb
Look at what happened to S. Wolfram, he got punked out of 2 top notch universities (mono-culture that it is, the Ivory Towers are not cracked up what they are supposed to be), but created a VERY successful entrepeneurial career. Similarly, Martin E. seems to be in the same position: his next startup should be INTERESTING. Some of the "seeds I've planted above" may interest him. I mentioned some of them to him at LA Auto Show (last Wednesday), but I missed an opportunity to have dinner with him on Wed for further disucssions. Drat! I had all my presentation materials in my backpack, with laptop. Martin talks fast, walks fast, he was REALLY HARD to keep up with!! I last saw him at the Audi booth for their media-presentation, didn't see him after that.
Sorry about getting off-track, but there are some opportunities coming my way (offered 2 partnerships in EV startups, given some of my above contacts).
Bottomline:
I think I might be a go-between, to hook up Marc Andreesen's Boutique, with Martin E. Or, I might run with it myself (with others).
Lesson Learned:
Networking is the Key. Business (& Research) is about making Connections, see the relationships, & securing Deals. I am REALLY GOOD AT THIS, since I'm a researcher TRAINED to "go crazy" & follow multiple threads SIMULTANEOUSLY. That's why my TMC posts look so..WEIRD. You're actually seeing my nested hierarchical neuronal activity in action.
"Multi-tasking MANIAC"
-- me
"We have a meeting in the morning. THen, the rest of the day, WE MULTIPLEX LIKE MAD"
-- Dr. Scott T. ('93 PhD UIUC, Vice President & Director of Research of XXX, 700 million dollar US Govt contractor)
"we're juggling many things at once at Tesla Motors"
-- M. Eberhard
[ not the exact quote, but you get the idea ]
Q&A with Linus Pauling (Caltech Giant in Chemistry, Nobelist):
Q: How do you come up with such good Ideas?
A: I try a LOT of Ideas ("shotgun approach")
Elon Musk could be the most OUTRAGEOUS "Multitasking Maniac" or "Multiplex like Mad" on Planet Earth. Who on earth, would try SpaceX (out of this world) & Tesla Motors (earthly), SIMULTANEOUSLY?? If he succeeds, he will become very famous. I think Martin needs to take a smarter more level-headed approach:
"The SMARTEST racer will win the Baja 500 [ race ]"
-- Ricky Johnson, '07 Baja 500, legendary Motocross champion
"Cooler heads will prevail"
"You're not thinking, you're REACTING"
That way, between Elon (outrageously wild) & Martin (controlled wildness), someone will succeed & lead the way for EV.
I know other researchers, who are even WORSE THAN ME!! Like a friend of mine, this former Harvard Physics junior faculty member (String Theory), a really wild character.
"The amazing thing about Nature, is how EVERYTHING is INTER-CONNECTED"
-- Dr. David Suzuki, Biologist ("Carl Sagan of Biology")
Look at the above (& previous post), you see "threads eminating out of UIUC". This "common ancestry" leads to relationships ("trust"), that is the backbone of successful startups/businesses. Obviously, other top-notch universities have the same Dynamic: Stanford (Doug's current one, he was Cornell undergrad..another heavy hitter in Academia), MIT (huge reputation), Harvard, Columbia, Princeton, Georgia-Tech, et al. All the Tier 1 universities (Big 10, Pac 10, etc)
TMC is pretty good, in that it is a Meta-Web type of thing for Tesla Motors. Doug & TEG (& others) are like "bees", digging for information via Google search (0th order information). They post it, analyze it...that's 1st, 2nd, 3rd order level of information processing. So, I'm contributing my Information (the UIUC connection, having been with Martin in grad-school).
Somewhere in the above "mess", is "jewels in the test-tube" for several startups in EV. Key players: Caltech & JPL, Georgia-Tech & GTRI, U. of Illinois, Stanford, MIT, UC San Diego/CALIT2. There is ONE GUY (my secret weapon), who I'm not going public with. He could be the most DANGEROUS weapon of them all (famous inventor & enrepeneur)..he's another PhD in AI/Artificial Intelligence
[ again!! the AI guys like Robotics..the topic of Martin's Masters Thesis, which naturally give them an affinity to Automotive ]
with a strong interest in Automotive. Hint: he's been on TED (where Martin has attended, where Bill Gross/Idealab..another Caltech alumni has given a talk)
Another lesson. Study hard, work hard. It takes you to high places, with other industrious people. Look at the above. Max Planck (Nobelist in Physics), R. Feynman (via Wally Rippel, Nobelist in Physics), Stephen Wolfram (genius, triple appt in Math/Physics/Computer Science, & successful entrepeneur), Martin Eberhard (serial entrepeneur, icon in EV), Marc Andreesen (serial entrepeneur, has his own VC firm).
I think Doug (Stanford Physics PhD candidate) is another "dangerous" guy, currently a lurker/observer, about to jump into the EV fray. I'm really WELL CONNECTED in Physics & HEP/High Energy Physics, it's close to my heart. Caltech calls its Engineering divisioin "Engineering & Applied Sciences". Physics is the "King of the Sciences", so I;m sure the key to Alternative Energy with be R&D. I think Physicists will be key. Just look at the 2 top dogs @Dept of Energy:
1) Dr. Stephen Chu
Stanford Physicists, Nobelist
2) Dr Stephen Koonin
MIT PhD, Caltech undergrad, Caltech Physics Prof & Provost, former Chief Scientist @BP/British Petroleum. He & Vice-Provost Dr. David Goodstein
[ who wrote the alarmist book "Out of Gas".
hired by R. Feynman, who is continuing with RPF's Educational Initiative "Feynman's Lectures on Physics", with Project Mathematics!. Done in conjunction with the legendary Dr. James Blinn, a renowned Computer Graphics researcher. I was in this Computer Graphics group, when Dr. Goodstein came to Dr. Blinn's office for this Production. He is in the same field as Dr. Ed Catmull, Loren Carpenter..the latter who is a Tesla Roadster owner ]
Both Goodstein & Koonin are on the warpath to push Alternative Energy. This is what Caltech is famous for: Agile/Mobile/Hostile:
"The Caltech people are REALLY SMART. THey get into arguments, but in the End..THEY DO THE RIGHT THING"
-- Dr. Fred S., PhD Geophysics/Stanford, my high-school classmate (dad was Theoretical Particle Physicist)
I think we're seeing it with Dr. Koonin (in conjunction with Dr. Chu), in their ATVM initiative at DoE. "Fueling" (no pun intended) Tesla Motors with 450 million, Fisker with 180 million, etc. We already have seen Wally Rippel & Alan Cocconi do their magic, at the Engineering level for EV.
I have some meetings schedule with Caltech's President (given that he's former colleagues with my former office-mate in grad school Steve Cross of Georgia-Tech), Provost & Vice-Provost. Martin's 2nd home is in Sierra Madre (just down the road from Caltech). There apparently is some "convergence" at Caltech (Mechanical Eng & Electrical Eng Dept, also the Nonlinear Dynamics & Control & Physics Dept). I'm working this "angle". Already, the NASA/JPL MSL/Mars Science Laboratory thing has "born fruit", so that's really promising. Which should trigger other "fruit".
I could use some perspective/advice from TMC "super geniuses", who are future EV clients. In the end, it's "all about the (EV) customer". The product has to be designed with the Consumer in mind, & Customer Service is the name-of-the-game:
"You [ consumer/client ] are the King, We [ engineers, businessmen ] are your Fools"
"I want to be Attentive to Your Needs, How may I give you Excellent Service"
