Curtis Priem

Last updated
Curtis Priem
Born
Curtis R. Priem

1958or1959(age 64–65)
Alma mater Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Known forCo-founding Nvidia
Scientific career
FieldsElectrical engineering
Institutions IBM
Sun Microsystems
Nvidia

Curtis R. Priem (born 1958or1959 [1] ) is an American electrical engineer.

Career

He received a B.S. degree in electrical engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in 1982. He designed the first graphics processor for the PC, the IBM Professional Graphics Adapter.

From 1986 to 1993, he was a senior staff engineer at Sun Microsystems, where he developed the GX graphics chip.

He co-founded Nvidia with Jen-Hsun Huang and Chris Malachowsky and was its Chief Technical Officer from 1993 to 2003. He retired from NVIDIA in 2003.

In 2000, RPI named him Entrepreneur of the Year. [2] From 2003 to 2007 he was a trustee of Rensselaer. [3] In 2004 he announced that he would donate an unrestricted gift of $40 million to the Institute. Rensselaer subsequently created the Curtis R. Priem Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center, named in his honor and usually referred to as "EMPAC" for short. [4]

He is also president of the Priem Family Foundation, which he established with his wife Veronica in September, 1999. The foundation is non-operating (i.e., has no office or staff, and therefore, no overhead) and exists only to give money to other foundations or charities.

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References

  1. Liu, Phoebe (November 26, 2023). "This Nvidia Cofounder Could Have Been Worth $70 Billion. Instead He Lives Off The Grid". Forbes. Archived from the original on November 27, 2023.
  2. Curtis Priem '82 Named Entrepreneur of the Year December 2000. Archived June 7, 2011, at the Wayback Machine
  3. Rensselaer Trustees Archived 2009-05-17 at the Wayback Machine
  4. 09.11.04 Rensselaer Announces $1 Billion Capital Campaign — the Largest in the University's History September 2004. Archived October 14, 2010, at the Wayback Machine