ANDREW J. VITERBI
President
Viterbi Group, LLC
Dr. Andrew Viterbi currently serves as President of the Viterbi Group, LLC, a company founded in 2000, which advises and invests in startup companies, predominantly in wireless communications, network infrastructure, voice recognition and digital recording.
In July 1985, Dr. Viterbi co-founded QUALCOMM Incorporated, a developer and manufacturer of mobile satellite communications and digital wireless telephony, where he served as Vice Chairman until 2000 and as Chief Technical Officer until 1996. Under his leadership, QUALCOMM received international recognition for innovative technology in the areas of digital wireless communication systems and products based on Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) technologies. Previously in 1968, Dr. Viterbi co-founded LINKABIT Corporation, a digital communications company, where he served as Executive Vice President and later as President in the early 1980’s.
From 1963 to 1973, Dr. Viterbi served as a Professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, (UCLA) School of Engineering and Applied Science, where he did fundamental work in digital communication theory and wrote numerous research papers and two books, for which he has received international recognition. He continued teaching on a part-time basis at the University of California, San Diego until 1994, where he is currently Professor Emeritus. Also in 2001 he was invited by Technion, Israel Institute of Technology, to become a Distinguished Visiting Professor of Electrical Engineering and in 2004 he was named to the Presidential Chair in the Department of Electrical Engineering at the University of Southern California.
From 1957 to 1963, Dr. Viterbi was a member of the Communications Research Section of the California Institute of Technology Jet Propulsion Laboratory. While there, he was one of the first communication engineers to recognize the potential and propose digital transmission techniques for space and satellite telecommunication systems.
Viterbi received the S.B. and S.M. degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1957, and a Ph.D. from the University of Southern California in 1962.
Andrew Viterbi receives the James Clerk Maxwell award of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and the Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE) from HRH Prince Philip, 2007.
PICTURE BY GARY DOAK
Dr. Viterbi has received numerous honors both in the U.S. and internationally. Among these are eight honorary doctorates, from universities in Canada, Israel, Italy and the U.S., the Marconi International Fellowship Award, the IEEE Alexander Graham Bell, the Claude Shannon and the James Clerk Maxwell Awards, the NEC C&C Award, the Eduard Rhein Foundation Award, the Christopher Columbus Medal, the Franklin Medal, the Robert Noyes Semiconductor Industry Award and the Finnish Technology Academy Millennium Laureate Award. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, the National Academy of Sciences, of which he is past Chair of the Computer and Information Science section, and is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 2001 he received an honorary title from the President of Italy and in 2007 the National Medal of Science from the President of the United States. In 2010, Viterbi received the IEEE Medal of Honor, the highest recognition of the Electrical Engineering profession.
From 1997 until 2001, he served as a member of the U.S. President’s Information Technology Advisory Committee and since1983 on MIT Visiting Committees for both the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department and the Bioengineering Department. He is currently a trustee of the University of Southern California, and formerly a Board Member of the Sanford-Burnham Institute and the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, and a trustee of the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute in Berkeley.
The vast majority of mobile phones throughout the world utilize the Viterbi algorithm for interference suppression, as do most digital satellite communication systems, both for business applications and for direct satellite broadcast to the home.
Andrew J. Viterbi
Addendum to Curriculum Vitae
Major Awards
Cristoforo Colombo Medal, Genova and CNR, 1975
Alexander Graham Bell Medal, IEEE, 1984
University of Southern California Outstanding Engineering Alumnus, 1986
Marconi International Fellowship Award, 1990
Shannon Award and Lecture, IEEE Information Theory Society, 1991
NEC C&C Award, Japan, 1992
Eduard Rhein Foundation Basic Research Award, Germany, 1994
“Grande Ufficiale della Repubblica” awarded by President of Italy, 2001
Benjamin Franklin Medal in Electrical Engineering, Franklin Institute, 2005
James Clerk Maxwell Award, IEEE and Royal Society of Edinburgh, 2007
Robert Noyes Award, Semiconductor Industry Association, 2007
Millennium Laureate, Technology Academy Finland, 2008
U.S. National Medal of Science, 2007
IEEE Medal of Honor, 2010
Royal Academy of Engineering International Award, 2011
Consumer Electronics Hall of Fame, 2011
National Inventors Hall of Fame, 2013
Honorary Degrees (Doctor Honoris Causa)
University of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, 1990
University of Rome, Tor Vergata, 1997
Technion, Israel Institute of Technology, 2000
University of Notre Dame, 2001
University of Rome, La Sapienza, 2004
University of Southern California, 2005
Polytechnic Institute of New York University, 2009
University of Cyprus, 2010
Academies
National Academy of Engineering, 1978
National Academy of Sciences, 1996
American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 2001
Royal Academy of Engineering, 2014
Speaker at Commencement Ceremonies
University of Waterloo, Canada
University of California, Berkeley Engineering College
Distinguished or Keynote Lectures at Universities and Academies
MIT, University of California Los Angeles, University of California San Diego, University of Southern California, University of Maryland, University of Massachusetts, University of Illinois, Purdue University, University of Notre Dame, Rice University, Princeton University, University of British Columbia, National Science Foundation, National Academy of Engineering, Indian Institute of Science
Major U.S. Government Advisory Committees
Army Science Board (’70’s and ’80’s)
President’s Information Technology Advisory Committee (1997-2001)
Member, UC President’s Council for the National Laboratories (2002)
Other
Visiting Committee for Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, MIT
Visiting Committee for Bioengineering, MIT
Trustee, University of Southern California
Trustee, Sanford-Burnham Institute, La Jolla, CA
Trustee, Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA
Trustee, Mathematical Sciences Research Institute, Berkeley, CA
Board Member, Marconi International Fellowship Foundation, New York
Member, National Academies’ (NRC) Computer Science and Telecommunications Board
Chairman, NAS Computer and Information Sciences Section
International Fellow, Royal Academy of Engineering