Optical View of an Entrepreneur

The WYKO Corporation was founded on December 27, 1982 to design, manufacture, sell, and service metrology instruments for many applications, with the largest market being in the magnetic data storage industry. WYKO grew out of the research my students and I did at the Optical Sciences Center at the University of Arizona, but it's origins actually started earlier at the Itek Corporation where I went to work after getting my PhD in optics at the University of Rochester. Founding, growing, and cashing out was an unbelievable experience that was more fun than I ever dreamed anything could be. In this talk I will discuss the formation, growth, and eventual selling of the WYKO Corporation to Veeco in 1997. Both the fun parts and the not so fun parts will be discussed. The biggest surprises experienced and what I think are the most important factors in growing a successful high-tech company will be described.