Co-Founder of $600-Million Company Finds Materials Research Eases His Mental Burden
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Co-Founder of $600-Million Company Finds Materials Research Eases His Mental Burden Based on an Interview with Tu Chen With three successive degrees in metallurgy, research at the university, and 16 years of materials research experience in industry, Tu Chen, a Taiwanese-born scientist, embarked on a venture, in 1983, that turned into a 600million-dollar business. Dr. Chen is cofounder and chair of the board of Komag, Incorporated, an independent manufacturer of thin-film disks, the primary storage medium for digital data used in computer hard-disk drives. Komag's corporate headquarters are located in San Jose, California, with U.S. manufacturing facilities in San Jose and Santa Rosa, California, and international manufacturing subsidiaries in Japan, Malaysia, and Thailand. This article is based on MRS Bulletin's interview with Dr. Chen to learn how his materials research background affected his career as an entrepreneur.
Combined, We had 60 Years of Experience In the 1960s, I went to the United States for graduate work at the University of Minnesota. Two areas were popular at that time for students of my background: semiconductors and magnetic materials. I decided to take magnetic materials as my major research effort because I was interested in that area since my undergraduate work. For 13 years at Xerox, I did my research mostly in material for optical devices and data storage applications. That was in the 1970s. During the 1980s, when the computer industry migrated from mainframes to PCs, demand for low-cost, high-capacity data storage devices increased. As a researcher at Xerox in the 1970s, I was conducting research on developing the technology for creating low-cost, high-capacity magneto-optical and magnetic thin-film hard-disk storage devices and materials. In the early 1980s, when the call came for the need for low-cost, high-capacity and small form factor data storage devices, the magnetic thin-film hard-disk memory became the chosen technology to meet the need. Unfortunately magnetic thin-film technology for hard-disk industry applications was still in its infancy. Therefore, more than a couple dozen companies, including some start-up companies, quickly jumped into the act to carry out research and development to try to make the magnetic thin-film media work and replace the limited capacity magnetic oxide technology which was in use for over several decades. So, early in
Tu Chen embarked on a venture, in 1983, that turned into a $600-million business. He is co-founder and chair of the board of Komag, Incorporated, an independent manufacturer of thin-Hlm disks.
1980, as many leading technology companies such as Ampex and Hewlett-Packard jumped into the action, I suggested to Xerox's management that they should support me by taking the results of my research and developing them into a useful device to meet the market demand, but the company declined. With their blessing, however, I obtained their permission to raise the funds to start this company [Komag, Incorporated]. At that time, when I started in t
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