Dado Banatao, the engineer, is credited with developing several key semiconductor technologies and is regarded as a Silicon Valley visionary. As an Investor, he has a keen sense of trends and opportunities involving technology solutions for computing and communications. In 1997, he was honored with the prestigious “Master Entrepreneur of the Year Award“ sponsored by Ernst & Young, Inc. Magazine and Merrill Lynch Business Financial Services. In an interview with AsiaWeek, he says "I've done tremendous things in the industry from a technical point of view. But what drove me first was the business side. For every success there are 100 to 200 failures. A main component of that is technical guys did not take care of business." Dado is also the managing partner of Tallwood Venture Capital. Prior to forming Tallwood, Dado was a venture partner at the Mayfield Fund. He co-founded three technology startups: S3 (SBLU), Chips & Technologies (INTC) and Mostron. He also held positions in engineering and general management at National Semiconductor, Seeq Technologies, Intersil and Commodore International. Dado pioneered the PC chip set and graphics acceleration architecture that continue to be two of the foundation technologies in every PC today.
Dado holds a B.S.E.E., cum laude, from the Mapua Institute of Technology in the Philippines and an M.S. in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University.
Source and Photo Credit: http://www.tallwoodvc.com/team/dado_b.html
Banatao and his family enjoy giving back to society. In the Philippines, Banatao through his Dado Banatao Educational Foundation, awards every year five educational scholarships to intelligent Filipino students who have bright futures in the field of engineering and technology. Also, with Philippine Development Foundation which he chairs, are giving brilliant young Filipino minds to school, towards maximixing their potentials for the future of the Philippines. Banatao also through his Banatao Filipino American Fund assists Northern California high school students of Filipino heritage who are pursuing a college education in engineering. He also built a computer center at his grade school in his childhood town of Iguig in Cagayan Valley, making it the only public school with the most modern computer network in the Philippines. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dado_Banatao