Suhas S. Patil (born 1944) is an Indian-American computer scientist, entrepreneur, and philanthropist. He founded Cirrus Logic, a fabless semiconductor company, after developing the Storage/Logic Array (S/LA) method of silicon compilation during his academic career at MIT and the University of Utah. Patil's research covered computer architecture, parallel processing, very-large-scale integration design, and integrated-circuit design automation. He is known in theoretical computer science for describing the cigarette smokers problem for concurrent computing in a 1971 MIT technical report. In December 1992 Patil co-founded TiE (The Indus Entrepreneurs) and served as its first president.

Early life and education

Patil grew up in Jamshedpur, India. His father was the first person in the family to attend university, earning an engineering degree and working at Tata Steel. During this period he developed the S/LA method of silicon compilation, which became the technical foundation of Patil Systems. This automated translation from logic description to circuit layout reduced the custom engineering effort required to produce application-specific integrated circuits.

Cirrus Logic

Patil founded Patil Systems, Inc. in 1981 in Salt Lake City, applying the S/LA technology to microchip-level controllers for computer hard disk drives. Patil served as chairman from founding until 1997, when he stepped down and was appointed Chairman Emeritus; he retired from that position in 2009.

Later ventures

After leaving the chairmanship of Cirrus Logic, Patil co-founded Digité, Inc., a software company focused on collaborative project management tools for distributed teams, and served as its chairman. He also founded Cradle Technologies and served as its CEO, developing multi-processor system-on-chip architectures for networked video applications. During this period Patil also mentored K. B. Chandrashekar in the founding of Exodus Communications; the company's IPO valued it at $560 million. In late 1993 he was chosen as TiE's first president, and the organization was formally incorporated in 1994. He introduced the concept of Charter Members, successful entrepreneurs who would mentor aspiring entrepreneurs and help underwrite TiE's operations. and the World Affairs Council of Northern California.

Personal life

Patil's son is DJ Patil, who served as the first Chief Data Scientist of the United States in the Office of Science and Technology Policy.

See also

  • Cigarette smokers problem
  • Cirrus Logic
  • TiE

References

  • Biography in IIT Kharagpur Alumni Directory
  • Oral History of Dr. Suhas Patil at the Computer History Museum (PDF)