Irwin Federman

CEO, U.S. Venture Partners

Inducted 2004

2006 Laureate, Irwin Federman has been a participant in the growth of Silicon Valley for the past four decades. He was CEO of a pioneer semiconductor company. He served as chairman of the Semiconductor Industry Association for two terms during tumultuous years of industry growth and international competition. It was during that time that both Sematech, and the Semiconductor Research Cooperative were founded. Forbes A.S.A.P. magazine has named Mr. Federman one of the 10 best venture capitalists in the country, and he has ranked highly in the Forbes parent magazine survey of influencers in the venture capital industry. Mr. Federman is a frequent speaker at technology industry functions, and has been liberally quoted in leading books on leadership, such as those authored by Warren Bennis, Jim Kouzos and Barry Posner. Mr. Federman joined U.S. Venture Partners in 1990. He has led investments in Centillium Communications, Check Point Software, Crescendo Communications, MMC Networks, Netro, Nuance Communications, QuickLogic, Resumix, SanDisk and Telcom Semiconductor. He is presently chairman of SanDisk, and serves on the boards of Centillium, Check Point, Nuance, and several privately held tech companies. Prior to the inception of his venture capital career, Mr. Federman was CEO of Monolithic Memories. He joined the company as chief financial officer in 1972 and was appointed to the CEO position in 1979 when the company was experiencing severe financial difficulties. MMI's turnaround is an industry legend. Emerging from near failure, the company introduced and promulgated a new type of digital circuit, field programmable logic. Mr. Federman has served two terms on the dean's advisory board of the Leavey School of Business at Santa Clara University. He has been a recipient of the Anti-Defamation League's Torch of Liberty Award, has received the Brotherhood Award from the National Conference of Community and Justice, and presently serves on the board of the Brooklyn College Foundation.