Ray Noorda’s Lasting Legacy on the Silicon Desert

Added by Brad Baldwin | October 10, 2006

Ray NordaRay Noorda
Born: June 19, 1924, in Ogden, Utah
Died: October 9, 2006, in Orem, Utah
Education: Ogden High School, Ogden, Utah, Weber State College in Ogden, Utah. Graduated University of Utah, 1949, BS, cum laude, in Electrical Engineering

Few people in technology have had the impact of Ray Noorda, especially when you consider the few truly large, public, non-Silicon Valley tech businesses. Sure Novell (NASDAQ:NOVL) has had it’s challenges over the past years, but it continues to employ thousands of people and support world-wide operations. Not many tech companies can claim that.

Ray Noorda’s Dutch immigrant parents and his own depression era experience helped form the core foundation that set Mr. Norda apart from the Ferrari-driving, dotcom-era execs. The stories of “Ray’s old pickup” are famous. His management leadership came from GE and personal experience with incubating and growing technology solutions that solved business and customer needs.

Utah Governor Jon M. Huntsman, Jr., said,

“Ray was one of the innovators of the Utah Miracle. He launched what would become Utah’s technology sector. He has left behind a monumental legacy and we are all in his debt. He will be deeply missed.”
- from Canopy Ventures

Today, Mr. Nooda’s legacy for growing technology companies lives on through the Canopy Ventures, an early-stage venture capital firm based in Utah. Canopy has investments in more than 100 companies and extensive philanthropic activities.

Rocky Mountain Voices salutes the contribution and legacy Ray Noorda provided to many of us who got our start in technology because of Novell. We produced a special podcast to honor this legacy with interviews from Ty Mattingly, David Bradford, Darl McBride, Ron Heinz, Ransom Love, and Drew Major.

Podcast tribute is posted at PodTech.net.

A great tribute to Mr. Noorda is available at http://www.canopy.com/raynoorda.

Technorati Tags: ,

Filed Under Current Events, Novell, Software, Utah 

Comments

One Response to “Ray Noorda’s Lasting Legacy on the Silicon Desert”

  1. Paul Allen (the lesser) » Tributes to Ray Noorda on October 12th, 2006 11:08 am

    [...] http://www.rockymountainvoices.com/blog/2006/10/10/ray-noordas-lasting-legacy-on-the-silicon-desert/ [...]

Leave a Reply