Irwin M. Jacobs Biography
Irwin M. Jacobs is an American electrical engineer born on 18th October 1933 in New Bedford, Massachusetts, United States. He is also the co-founder Qualcomm and former chairman of trustees board in the Salk Institute.
Irwin M. Jacobs Age
Irwin M. Jacobs is 85 years old as of 2018.
Irwin M. Jacobs Net worth
Irwin M. Jacobs has an estimated net worth of $1.23 billion.
Irwin M. Jacobs Family
Irwin M. Jacobs was born to a jewish family.
Irwin M. Jacobs Wife
Irwin M. Jacobs married Joan Jacob in 1954 and they were blessed with four children. His wife is a native graduate from Cornell University in 1952.
Irwin M. Jacobs Children
Irwin M. Jacobs has four children Paul E. Jacobs who is the CEO of Qualcomm, Jeff Jacobs who is the Chief Marketing Officer of Qualcomm, Hal Jacobs who is a co-producer of the musical Jersey Boys and Gary E. Jacobs who is the head of the board of the Gary and Jerri-Ann Jacobs High Tech High Charter School. His grandson Adam Jacobs is a former catcher of the Cornell University baseball team.
Irwin M. Jacobs Education
Irwin M. Jacobs attended Cornell University in where he got a degree in bachelor of electrical engineering in the year 1956. He later joined Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1957 and 1959 where he did S.M and Sc.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.
Irwin M. Jacobs Career
Irwin M. Jacobs started his career as a businessman which brought him to the greater heights upto where he is. He was an Assistant and Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering at MIT from 1959 to 1966 and also a Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at University of California, San Diego from 1966 to 1972. He co-authored a textbook entitled Principles of Communication Engineering in 1965, which is still in use today. UCSD’s Jacobs School of Engineering is named for him and his wife.
In 1968, he co-founded Linkabit Corporation with Andrew Viterbi to develop satellite encryption devices. That company merged with M/A-COM in 1980, becoming M/A-COM Linkabit.
In 1985, he went on and co-found Qualcomm along with Andrew Viterbi, Harvey White, Adelia Coffman, Andrew Cohen, Klein Gilhousen, and Franklin Antonio. QUALCOMM developed the OmniTRACS system was deemed one of the world’s most “technologically advanced two-way mobile satellite communications and tracking systems”. He pioneered these systems which use the communication bandwidth more efficiently than the older fixed time-sliced TDMA technology. Its Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) has been adopted as one of two digital standards (the other being GSM) used in the next generation of cellular telephones in North America at the time. Jacobs announced on March 3, 2009 that he had stepped down as chairman of Qualcomm and that Paul E. Jacobs, his son, had been named to succeed him
Irwin M. Jacobs Affiliation
Irwin M. Jacobs is a member of the National Academy and Engineering and a Fellow of the IEEE. He is also a member of the Inter-American Dialogue. He is the chairman of the Salk Institute for Biological Studies, and he is also on the international advisory board for the Israel Institute of Technology. Additionally, he serves on the advisory board for the School of Economics and Management at Tsing Hua University in Beijing. He the active member on the board of directors aqnd Pacific Council on International Policy in Los Angeles.
Irwin M. Jacobs Awards
- In 1992, he was awarded the Entrepreneur of the Year Award in High Technology by the Institute of American Entrepreneurs,
- In May 1993, he was awarded the American Electronics Association (AEA) “Inventing America’s Future” award.
- In 1994, for his development of CDMA, Jacobs was awarded the National Medal of Technology and Innovation.
- In 1994, he was also awarded the “Cornell University Entrepreneur of the Year” Award.
- In 1995, Jacobs won the IEEE Alexander Graham Bell Medal – For outstanding contributions to telecommunications, including leadership, theory, practice and product development.
- In 2001, Jacobs was awarded the Bower Award for Business Leadership in 2001.
- In 2004, Jacobs and his wife Joan Jacobs are contributors to public arts and education in San Diego. For this, Jacobs was awarded the Woodrow Wilson Award for Corporate Citizenship in 2004.
- In 2005, Jacobs delivered the 2005 commencement speech at MIT, and the 2008 commencement speech at the Jacobs School of Engineering.
- In 2007, Jacobs and Andrew J. Viterbi received the 2007 IEEE/RSE Wolfson James Clerk Maxwell Award, for “fundamental contributions, innovation, and leadership that enabled the growth of wireless telecommunications”.
- In 2009, he was named a Fellow of AAAS (American Association for the Advancement of Science).
- In 2011, he received the Marconi Prize together with Jack Wolf.
- In 2011, he was named a Marconi Prize recipient and Marconi Fellow.
- In 2011, Branson was inducted into the International Air & Space Hall of Fame at the San Diego Air & Space Museum.
- In 2012, Jacobs was named the W. P. Carey School of Business Dean’s Council of 100 Executive of the Year, which honors change-making business leaders who serve as models for today’s business students.
- In 2013, Jacobs was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame.
Irwin M. Jacobs Honors
- In 2013, he received the Medal of Honor from the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), which is the highest honor an engineer can receive from his or her peers. The IEEE said he was receiving the award not just for his innovations but for “the ability to translate innovation into industry applications, time after time after time.”
- In November 2013, he was conferred the title of “Distinguished Honor Chair Professor” of National Tsing Hua University, TAIWAN.
- On 19 August 2014, Jacobs was conferred the “Honorary Doctor of Engineering Degree” (Honoris Causa) from National Tsing Hua University, TAIWAN.
- On 25 October 2014, Jacobs was conferred the “Honorary Doctor of Engineering Degree” from Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong, CHINA.
- In 2014, Jacobs was elected to the Computer History Museum as a Fellow – for “his pioneering work in digital mobile telephony, data and communications, and technology”.
- In 2015, Jacobs received the Carnegie Medal of Philanthropy , for having made a significant and lasting impact on a particular field, nation and/or the international community.
- In 2017, Jacobs, along with Andrew Viterbi, received the IEEE Milestone Award for their CDMA and spread spectrum development that drives the mobile industry.
- In 01 February 2018, he was appointed as an Honorary Advisor to the President of National Tsing Hua University, Taiwan.
- In March 2018, he was named the winner of IMEC Lifetime of Innovation Award
Irwin M. Jacobs Philanthropist
Irwin M. Jacobs has contributed millions of dollars to the field of education through generous donations and grants to several schools and organizations. His donations have gone mostly towards fellowships and scholarships for deserving students in the fields of engineering and computer science, as well as the arts, and are focused in the San Diego area. The San Diego Union Tribune in 2011 dubbed him the “Philanthropist in Chief”
In September 2009 he donated $31 million to his post graduate degrees school in Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He also donated some money to the University of California, San Diego where he was a professor of computer science and engineering for several years. He has aslo donated $62 million to the American Society for Technion, his alma mater Cornell University, KPBS Radio and Television, and San Diego Natural History Museum. His KPBS donation was in the sum of $1 million, and the multi-year gift is designed to strengthen the station’s local journalism and news collaboration with NPR. The Jacobs donation funds have build studios for KPBS and have supported the station for decades. In 2010 he funded an engineering study on how to fulfill a long-planned proposal to remove automobiles from the Plaza de Panama in San Diego’s Balboa Park and agreed to chair a committee to study the proposal and develop private funding for it.
He pledged $120 million to San Diego Symphony, with a similar amount on the Jacobs School of Engineering at the University of California, San Diego, and$100 million for UCSD’s future specialty hospital and $20 million to replace the central library in downtown San Diego. Also in 2005 the Joan and Irwin Jacobs Center for La Jolla Playhouse was named after Jacobs and his wife in honor of their philanthropic contributions towards the institution’s development. In April 2013, the Jacobs donated $133 million to the joint Cornell Technion(Israel) Technology campus development on Roosevelt Island in New York City. The Joan and Irwin Jacobs TIX Institute located at National Tsing Hua University, Taiwan, was sponsored by Dr. Jacobs with the mission of encouraging innovations and entrepreneurship.
Irwin M. Jacobs Elementary school
Irwin M. Jacobs Qualcomm Hall
