Dirk I. Gates (born June 25, 1961 in

Fort Wayne, Indiana Fort Wayne is a city in Allen County, Indiana, United States, and its county seat. Located in northeastern Indiana, the city is west of the Ohio border and south of the Michigan border. The city's population was 263,886 at the 2020 census ...

) is an American

business Business is the practice of making one's living or making money by producing or Trade, buying and selling Product (business), products (such as goods and Service (economics), services). It is also "any activity or enterprise entered into for ...

man, founder and

chief executive officer A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a chief executive or managing director, is the top-ranking corporate officer charged with the management of an organization, usually a company or a nonprofit organization. CEOs find roles in variou ...

of two companies, Xircom and

Xirrus Cambium Networks Corporation is an American manufacturer of wireless telecommunications equipment, including WiFi, Enterprise WiFi, Network switch, Internet of Things, and fixed wireless , fixed wireless broadband and Wi-Fi for enterprises produ ...

Career

In 1983, Gates received a Bachelor of Science in Engineering from

California State University, Northridge California State University, Northridge (CSUN or Cal State Northridge), is a public university in the Northridge neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, United States. With a total enrollment of 36,848 students (as of Fall 2024), it has the ...

and then completed the

MBA A Master of Business Administration (MBA) is a professional degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration; elective courses may allow further study in a particular a ...

program at

Pepperdine University Pepperdine University () is a private university, private Christianity, Christian research university affiliated with the Churches of Christ, with its main campus in Los Angeles County, California, United States. Pepperdine's main campus consists ...

in 1990 at the age of 27 while co-founding his first company, Xircom, with fellow entrepreneur Kirk Mathews. Xircom created the industry's first product Ethernet Pocket Adapter which allowed notebook computers to connect to Ethernet

LAN Lan or LAN may refer to: Science and technology * Local asymptotic normality, a fundamental property of regular models in statistics * Longitude of the ascending node, one of the orbital elements used to specify the orbit of an object in space * ...

s, along with the industry's first Type III

PC Card PC Card is a technical standard specifying an expansion card interface for laptops and personal digital assistants, PDAs. The PCMCIA originally introduced the 16-bit Industry Standard Architecture, ISA-based PCMCIA Card in 1990, but renamed it to ...

called the RealPort that allowed users to connect Ethernet cables and phone cables directly to the notebook without the use of

dongles A dongle is a small piece of computer hardware that connects to a port on another device to provide it with additional functionality, or enable a pass-through to such a device that adds functionality. In computing, the term was initially synony ...

. Gates served as Xircom’s president after its launch in November 1988, became

in 1991, and in 1995, he became

chairman The chair, also chairman, chairwoman, or chairperson, is the presiding officer of an organized group such as a board, committee, or deliberative assembly. The person holding the office, who is typically elected or appointed by members of the gro ...

of the company.( Foundation Board Members’ Biographies) In March 2001, after 13 years in operation, Gates negotiated the sale of Xircom to

Intel Corporation Intel Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California, and incorporated in Delaware. Intel designs, manufactures, and sells computer components such as central processing ...

for US$748 million. Gates served as vice president and

general manager A general manager (GM) is an executive who has overall responsibility for managing both the revenue and cost elements of a company's income statement, known as profit & loss (P&L) responsibility. A general manager usually oversees most or all of ...

of mobile communications at

Intel Intel Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California, and Delaware General Corporation Law, incorporated in Delaware. Intel designs, manufactures, and sells computer compo ...

and then went on to co-found

, a

Wi-Fi Wi-Fi () is a family of wireless network protocols based on the IEEE 802.11 family of standards, which are commonly used for Wireless LAN, local area networking of devices and Internet access, allowing nearby digital devices to exchange data by ...

technology company, in early 2004 with Patrick Parker and Steve DeGennaro. He served as the Chief Executive Officer of Xirrus until June 2012, at which point he assumed the role of Executive Chairman. Xirrus designs and sells

wireless networking A wireless network is a computer network that uses wireless data connections between network nodes. Wireless networking allows homes, telecommunications networks, and business installations to avoid the costly process of introducing cables in ...

equipment called

Wi-Fi Array Cambium Networks Corporation is an American manufacturer of wireless telecommunications equipment, including Enterprise WiFi, Network switch, Internet of Things, and fixed wireless broadband and Wi-Fi for enterprises products for Internet acce ...

s based on the

IEEE The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is an American 501(c)(3) organization, 501(c)(3) public charity professional organization for electrical engineering, electronics engineering, and other related disciplines. The IEEE ...

standards

802.11a IEEE 802.11a-1999 or 802.11a was an amendment to the IEEE 802.11 wireless local network specifications that defined requirements for an orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) communication system. It was originally designed to support w ...

802.11b IEEE 802.11b-1999 or 802.11b is an amendment to the IEEE 802.11 wireless networking specification that extends throughout up to 11 Mbit/s using the same 2.4 GHz band. A related amendment was incorporated into the IEEE 802.11-2007 standard. ...

802.11g IEEE 802.11g-2003 or 802.11g is an amendment to the IEEE 802.11 specification that operates in the 2.4 GHz microwave band. The standard has extended link rate to up to 54 Mbit/s using the same 20 MHz bandwidth as 802.11b uses to achieve 11& ...

, and

802.11n IEEE 802.11n-2009, or 802.11n, is a wireless-networking standard that uses multiple antennas to increase data rates. The Wi-Fi Alliance has also retroactively labelled the technology for the standard as Wi-Fi 4. It standardized support for multi ...

. In 1992, Gates was honored as High

Technology Technology is the application of Conceptual model, conceptual knowledge to achieve practical goals, especially in a reproducible way. The word ''technology'' can also mean the products resulting from such efforts, including both tangible too ...

Entrepreneur Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value in ways that generally entail beyond the minimal amount of risk (assumed by a traditional business), and potentially involving values besides simply economic ones. An entreprene ...

of the Year for the

Greater Los Angeles area Greater Los Angeles is the most populous metropolitan area in the U.S. state of California, encompassing five counties in Southern California extending from Ventura County in the west to San Bernardino County and Riverside County in the east, ...

and in 1994, made ''

Forbes ''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine founded by B. C. Forbes in 1917. It has been owned by the Hong Kong–based investment group Integrated Whale Media Investments since 2014. Its chairman and editor-in-chief is Steve Forbes. The co ...

'' Magazine's Whiz Kid list of the five youngest

CEOs Kea (), also known as Tzia () and in antiquity Keos (, ), is a Greek island in the Cyclades archipelago in the Aegean Sea. Kea is part of the Kea-Kythnos regional unit. Geography It is the island of the Cyclades complex that is closest to Att ...

of the Best small Companies in

America The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. Dirk appeared on the

Dylan Ratigan Dylan Jason Ratigan (born April 19, 1972) is an American businessman, author, film producer, former host of MSNBC's '' The Dylan Ratigan Show'' and political commentator for '' The Young Turks''. He was a candidate for the U.S. House of Represen ...

show on

MSNBC MSNBC is an American cable news channel owned by the NBCUniversal News Group division of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. Launched on July 15, 1996, and headquartered at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in Manhattan, the channel primarily broadcasts r ...

in September 2010 and in January 2011, Gates was featured in a Kym McNicholas segment on

TV. He has also given countless speeches and presentations on Wi-Fi including the

keynote address A keynote in public speaking is a talk that establishes a main underlying theme. In corporate or commercial settings, greater importance is attached to the delivery of a keynote speech or keynote address. The keynote establishes the framework fo ...

Interop Interop is an annual information technology conference organised by Informa PLC. Founded in 1986, the event takes place in the US and Tokyo (Japan) each year. Interop promotes interoperability and openness, beginning with IP networks and continu ...

New York 2010. Gates has been a member of the

CSUN California State University, Northridge (CSUN or Cal State Northridge), is a public university in the Northridge, Los Angeles, Northridge neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, United States. With a total enrollment of 36,848 students (as o ...

Foundation Board, has served as

Chairman The chair, also chairman, chairwoman, or chairperson, is the presiding officer of an organized group such as a board, committee, or deliberative assembly. The person holding the office, who is typically elected or appointed by members of the gro ...

of the

Viewpoint School Viewpoint School is an independent school located in Calabasas, California. The school is coeducational, with students enrolled from Transitional Kindergarten through the twelfth grade. Enrollment in the 2014–15 school year was 1,200, making ...

Board of

Trustees Trustee (or the holding of a trusteeship) is a legal term which, in its broadest sense, refers to anyone in a position of trust and so can refer to any individual who holds property, authority, or a position of trust or responsibility for the ...

, and is also a member of the Pepperdine Board of Visitors. In 1997, Dirk Gates donated $1 million (apiece) of his personal funds to

and Pepperdine University to express his gratitude for the knowledge he acquired during his schooling.

Personal life

Gates is an avid member of the

high-power rocketry High-power rocketry is a hobby similar to model rocketry. The major difference is that higher impulse range motors are used. The National Fire Protection Association, National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) definition of a high-power rocket i ...

community, frequently flying large

model rocket A model rocket is a small rocket designed to reach low altitudes (e.g., for a model) and #Model rocket recovery methods, be recovered by a variety of means. According to the United States National Association of Rocketry, National Associati ...

s in California and Nevada. To facilitate his hobby, Gates started a side company, Gates Brothers Rocketry, with his brother, Erik Gates. The duo appeared on several episodes of the popular

Discovery Channel Discovery Channel, known as The Discovery Channel from 1985 to 1995, and often referred to as simply Discovery, is an American cable channel that is best known for its ongoing reality television shows and promotion of pseudoscience. It init ...

TV series

MythBusters ''MythBusters'' is a science entertainment television series created by Peter Rees (producer), Peter Rees and produced by Beyond International in Australia. The series premiered on the Discovery Channel on January 23, 2003. It was broadcast in ...

that involved rocketry, including the pilot episode.http://dsc.discovery.com/tv/mythbusters/ MythBusters)

References

Sources

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Gates, Dirk 1961 births American technology company founders California State University, Northridge alumni Computer hardware engineers Living people Businesspeople from Fort Wayne, Indiana