SILICON GRAPHICS' PRESIDENT AND CEO EDWARD R. McCRACKEN NAMED CO-CHAIR OF JOINT VENTURE: SILICON VALLEY
Silicon Graphics announced today that its president and chief executive officer Edward R. McCracken has accepted the position of co-chair of Joint Venture: Silicon Valley, a broad coalition of business, education, government and community leaders brought together to revitalize Silicon Valley and create a strong partnership for economic vitality and quality of life. McCracken will work with former California State Senator Becky Morgan, Joint Venture: Silicon Valley's president and CEO, and San Jose Mayor Susan Hammer, who also serves as co-chair.
"Silicon Graphics embodies the entrepreneurial spirit that will help to revitalize Silicon Valley," said Morgan. "In its ten year history, the company has demonstrated financial success, created an environment that readily adapts to change and provided a management style that defies traditional hierarchy. We hope to tap into and apply the leadership that McCracken has shown as we move forward to the implementation phase of our 'Blueprint for the 21st Century'. I look forward to working with him as Joint Venture leads the effort to accomplish our mission: to retain jobs, create jobs and prepare the work force for these jobs.""The rate of technological change-the driving force behind Silicon Valley-has never been more dramatic than in the 1990s. With a ten-fold increase in performance every 3 1/2 years, companies, industries and even people must constantly reinvent and re-engineer the way they work to remain competitive," said McCracken. "The joining of talent in Joint Venture will enable us to work toward reinventing Silicon Valley, serving as a collaborative example for businesses and the public sector throughout the United States." McCracken heads Silicon Graphics, the leading manufacturer of visual computing systems. Founded in 1982, Silicon Graphics is the eighth fastest growing company on the Fortune 500, employing more than 3800 people worldwide and 2700 people in the U.S. The company also served as the venue for President Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Gore's announcement of the administration's technology policy earlier this year.
Prior to joining Silicon Graphics in 1984, McCracken spent 16 years with Hewlett-Packard Company, serving as a group general manager in the computer systems area. He received an M.B.A. from Stanford University and a B.S.E.E. from Iowa State University, where he now serves as a Governor of the Iowa State University Foundation. In addition to his new responsibilities as co-chair of Joint Venture: Silicon Valley, McCracken was a founding member of the group's CEO Advisory board and later joined the Smart Valley Board of Directors, a major Joint Venture initiative. He is also a member of the Executive Committee on the Computer Systems Policy Project.
Joint Venture: Silicon Valley is a broad coalition of business, education, government and community leaders who have come together to develop a strategic road map for economic renewal in Silicon Valley. This revolutionary movement-which involves more than 1,000 people-has pursued an economic growth plan in three phases. Phase I diagnosed the current state of the economy; Phase II, which was completed on June 23, produced a Blueprint of the 21st Century Community and Phase III, launched on June 24, 1993, is the implementation phase of Joint Venture: Silicon Valley's initiatives.
