Frank S. Greene, a pioneering Silicon Valley technologist, died unexpectedly Saturday at El Camino Hospital. He was 71.
Greene stood among technology giants Robert Noyce, David Packard, William Hewlett and the Varian brothers as one of 63 inductees into the Silicon Valley Engineering Hall of Fame, conferred by the Silicon Valley Engineering Council.
He was also hailed as one of the first black technologists, breaking the color barrier in the industry.
He developed high-speed semiconductor computer-memory systems at Fairchild Semiconductor R&D Labs in the 1960s. He started two technology companies and later founded NewVista Capital, a venture firm with a special focus on minority- and female-headed firms.
Greene also launched the GO-Positive Foundation, which offers leadership programs with “core positive values” for high school and college students.
Greene grew up in the highly segregated St. Louis of the 1950s, where “making it through life was a civil-rights activity in itself,” he said.
When Washington University opened up to people of color, Greene said the top 10 to 15 percent of students from his high school received scholarships. He was in the second class that included black students at the university.
Greene was the first black cadet to make it through the four-year U.S. Air Force ROTC program in 1961. He became an U.S. Air Force captain.
Armed with a master’s degree from Purdue University, he started as a test engineer at Fairchild then moved into research and development in chip design.
Greene holds the patent for the integrated circuit that made Fairchild a semiconductor leader in the late 1960s.
He earned his doctorate in electrical engineering from Santa Clara University and taught electrical engineering and computer science at five universities.
He founded two software companies, Technology Development Corp., which went public in 1985, and ZeroOne Systems Inc., which was sold to Sterling Software.
More recently, Greene laid out some of his ideas about leadership in his “VRE Leadership” workbooks, standing for “Vision,” “Relationships” and “Execute.”