Andrew J. Viterbi, a renowned engineer and wireless communications magnate, and his wife, Erna, will donate $52 million to the University of Southern California, which will name its engineering school for the couple.
A co-founder of San Diego-based Qualcomm Inc., Viterbi pioneered technology used in cellular telephones throughout the world. He earned his doctorate in electrical engineering at USC in 1962.
The gift enhances USC's effort to be considered among the nation's top engineering schools, along with such institutions as Caltech, MIT, Stanford and UC Berkeley. The one-time cash gift, which will be announced Tuesday in a ceremony on campus, will go to the engineering school's endowment, which now stands at $120 million.
Just as important as the boost to the school's endowment is the cachet of Viterbi's name, said C.L. Max Nikias, dean of the engineering school. "The name raises our visibility and reputation instantly. Viterbi is a big name in both academic circles and industry."
In 1967, Viterbi published the Viterbi algorithm, which allows the rapid decoding of overlapping signals. In one of its most successful commercial applications, the algorithm enables numerous cellular phones to communicate without interfering with each other. The algorithm is employed in hundreds of millions of cellular phones today.
Erna Viterbi recalled in an interview with USC officials that her husband came up with the algorithm in the midst of a celebration of the Jewish holiday Purim. Their children had just taken first-prize in a costume contest, but Andrew was fixated on a scrap of paper on which he had been scribbling.
"I'd made them the costumes and I really had to try to get him out of this thing he was working on," she said, but her husband remained focused on his work. "And I said, 'So, did you come up with something really?' "
Andrew, she said, replied, "Yeah, but I thought about it, it's really nothing major."
The algorithm and other scientific achievements earned Viterbi numerous honors including membership in the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Before co-founding Qualcomm in 1985 with Irwin M. Jacobs (for whom UC San Diego's engineering school is named), Viterbi was an engineering professor at UCLA and UC San Diego.
He credited much of his success to his teaching experience. "The best research often comes out when you're thinking about what you're going to teach your graduate students," he said.
