Yet another Indian techie donates $1.5 million to Canadian varsity

Ottawa: Hyderabad-born Indian-Canadian techie Sreedhar Natarajan has announced to donate $1.5 million to the Canada-India Centre for Excellence in Science, Technology, Trade and Policy at Carleton University based in Ottawa.

He has become the second Indian techie within two weeks to make a huge donation to a Canadian university. Just last week, another Indian techie, Vasudev Chanchalani, had donated $1 million to Canada's University of Waterloo to launch the Chanchlani India Policy Centre exclusively devoted to 'the Canada-India corridor'

Carleton is the only university in the world to have a full-fledged India-centric Centre of Excellence in Science, Technology, Trade and Policy. Set up last year with Indian assistance, the Centre of Excellence aims to raise awareness about bilateral studies and public diplomacy, and develop initiatives to build a better understanding of both countries.

As this world-famous Canadian university hosts two India-centric Education and Innovation Summits from this week, Ottawa-based Natarajan has announced to give $1.5 million to its Centre of Excellence focused on India.

The donation will permanently endow the research and policy activities of the centre.

The 41-year-old India techie, who came to Ottawa in 2002 after the dotcom bust, said Thursday, "I do a lot of work in Asia and can see a great need for a Canada-India Centre which holistically looks at technology and policy issues.

"I made this donation because I want future generations of students to learn more about today's global business realities.''

To thank the multi-millionaire Indian techie, Carleton University has announced to name the three-storey glass atrium of the Canada-India Centre after him.

University president Roseann O'Reilly Runte said, "The generous support of alumni like Mr. Natarajan will assist Carleton in serving the national and shared visions of Canada and India in multiplying opportunities for joint research, exchanges, and work with the business community to promote economic development through joint projects, particularly in the areas of technology and the environment.''

Natarajan came to the US as a student to get his masters degree in computer engineering from the University of Louisiana. He worked with companies like Texas Instruments before moving to Canada in 2002 to join Ottawa-based Atmos Semiconductor.

After losing a couple of jobs, he started his own Emerging Memory Technologies Inc. in 2004. He sold it in 2007 to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp. - which is the global leader in made-to-order computer chips needed in computers, smart phones and other telecom equipment.
 

(Gurmukh Singh can be contacted at gurmukh.s@ians.in)
 

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