Engineering News - Spring 2006

The Engineering Council’s Long Term Planning Committee has taken seriously its mandate to create a long-term plan for the School. Calling its report “A 2020 Vision for SEAS,” the committee has spent the past six months assessing national and international trends, evaluating the plans of other engineering schools, and defining the strengths of Columbia SEAS. The final report will be presented in the Fall.

While this committee is focused on the future, other Engineering Council committees are focusing on the present. At its April meeting, the Council met with faculty and students of each department to funnel suggestions to the Dean as part of an immediate action plan. This year, several new members recently added to the Council are part of this evaluation process. They include:

Suzanne Bell is a partner in the law firm of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati in the technology transactions practice. She handles technology and intellectual property transactions—with an emphasis on outsourcing transactions and strategic alliances—for software, hardware, semiconductor, communications, retail, Internet, and life sciences companies.

“My Columbia education gave me the background and ability to understand very well my clients’ technology businesses, and it also nurtured my interests in the laws and businesses related to science and technology. This has helped me enormously in my career and today I represent technology enterprises in a variety of industries in their technology and intellectual property transactions.”

Edward D. Heffner is a returning member of the Engineering Council and a former member of the CESAA Board of Managers. He joined the family business, Empire City Iron Works in Long Island City, upon his graduation from SEAS. He is Executive Vice President of the firm, which does structural steel work and stairways for New York area construction projects. They have provided steel work for Columbia’s Schapiro Center, Levien Gym and Lerner Hall; for the new 7 World Trade Center (and the original one, destroyed on 9/11); renovation of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and, at 30 Rockefeller Plaza, two flights of elliptical spiral staircases in the new lobby and the steel work and glass supports in the lobby area and at “Top of the Rock.”

“My Columbia Engineering education helped me to interact and get along with all different groups of people—people from different countries with concerns different from my own. More importantly, my education was extremely well-rounded, not just the engineering portion of it. Specifically, the required core curriculum afforded me the opportunity to take literature, writing, and philosophy courses, taught by world-renowned professors, which I ordinarily would never have taken.”

Alan Silberstein ’69

Hie Jae Kim was born in Korea and attended Meong Ji University in Seoul from 1965 to 1966. He received a B.A. from Hankuk University of Foreign Studies in Seoul in 1969, followed by a certificate from Columbia’s American Language Program in 1972. He received the BS in Mechanical Engineering in 1977. He is Vice President of Syska & Hennessy, one of the largest international consulting firms, and travels all over the world setting up engineering consulting deals. He previously worked for the late Richard Baum ’41, a former member of the Engineering Council, at Jaros, Baum and Bolles.

Lu Lo graduated from SEAS in 1982, majoring in mathematical methods. He started one of his family’s businesses, Sung Foo Kong Group, by buying into a well-established construction company in Hong Kong and, in 1987, expanded the company business. In 1989, he took the company public and it expanded into related business such as property developments, power plant investments and equity investments. He is currently Managing Director of Sun Fook Kong Holdings. Since 1984, he has also been a director of Great Eagle Holdings, a family-controlled company that is one of Hong Kong’s leading property and hotel companies.

“I acquired the basic skill of logical thinking, viewed investment opportunities with the aid of probability models, learned to be analytical when studying statistics related to our everyday lives. All these I must attribute to my time spent at Columbia. All these have helped me with my career, which primarily is investments-related. I learned that success in any investment is not guaranteed, and my task is only to find the avenue that gives me the highest probability to achieve that goal. If I can do that, say, 3 out of 4 times, then I should have pretty good results. And thinking this way makes me a relatively optimistic person, because every time I run into failure, I know that the next time I do the same investment, success will be more likely. Yet there are still goals that I haven’t reached. But someday, I’ll get there, based on the optimism that I acquired at Columbia.”

Anna Kazanjian Longobardo was the first woman graduate of Columbia’s Mechanical Engineering Department and the only woman to win the Alumni Association’s Egleston Medal for Distinguished Engineering Achievement. As an engineering executive at Unisys Corp., she headed a world-wide organization supporting complex military and weather radar systems in more than 100 locations until her retirement in 1995. She was the first woman to lead the Columbia Engineering School Alumni Association, the University Alumni Federation (for two terms), the Society of Columbia Graduates, and the Engineering Council, serving as chair for two terms. She also served as a University Alumni Trustee and is now Trustee Emerita.

“Certainly, the opportunity to attend a highly-rated engineering program was valued by this young New York teenager. To have my professors tell us that we were being prepared for leadership roles in this country’s biggest and most important industries was absolutely mind-expanding for this teenage GIRL, and I chose to believe and live it from the very first day and for 45 years. To study on a campus where we could hear Meyer Schapiro lecture on Picasso’s Guernica, take Irwin Edman’s Logic course, hear Margaret Mead among many others, was incredible. Thank you, Columbia Engineering.”

Ronald P. Mangione is a principal in the firm of Lawless & Mangione, Architects and Engineers, and is the partner in charge of electrical/mechanical projects. He is a licensed Professional Engineer in New York, Connecticut, and New Jersey, a member of the New York Society of Engineers and IEEE.

Mangione, an electrical engineer, is serving his second term as president of the Columbia Engineering School Alumni Association.

“I valued the core curriculum at SEAS that presented a well rounded education. I believe the competitive atmosphere at Columbia, associating with the high caliber of fellow students, prepared me for the rigors of the engineering profession.”

Daniel R. Omstead is President and Chief Executive Officer of Hambrecht & Quist Capital Management, LLC, an SEC registered Investment Advisor. He is also President of H&Q Lifesciences Investors and H&Q Healthcare Investors, two NYSE listed closed-end mutual funds that make venture and public equity investments principally in emerging healthcare technology related companies. Prior to joining HQCM, he was President and CEO of Reprogenesis, Inc., a private stage biotechnology company developing therapies in the field of regenerative medicine. He is on the Board of Directors of Idun Pharmaceuticals, Agilix Corporation and Concentric Medical. He is also an Overseer at the Joslin Diabetes Center and a Director of Shelter, Inc., a Cambridge, MA, based homeless shelter agency.

Chatchai Piyasombatkul was born in Bangkok, Thailand, and graduated from SEAS with a B.S. in chemical engineering. Since 1982, he has been with Metro-Ply Group, a group of companies that are one of the biggest wood-based panel manufacturers in Southeast Asia and one of the largest real-estate companies in Bangkok. He currently serves as the president of the companies. His public service positions include Advisor to the Minister, Ministry of Information, Communication and Technology, and Director of Wastewater Management Authority of the Ministry of Science, Technology and Environment. He is also Director of Thailand Swimming Association and Vice Chairman of Saint Gabriel’s Parents and Teachers Association.

David Rickey graduated from Marietta College in 1978 with a B.S. degree in mathematics summa cum laude, from Columbia SEAS in 1979 with a B.S. in metallurgy and from Stanford University in 1981 with an M.S. in materials science. Prior to his retirement in 2005, Rickey was CEO, President and Chairman of Applied Micro Circuits Corp., a global leader in network and embedded PowerPC processing, optical transport and storage solutions. He was responsible for taking AMCC from $50 million per year revenue in 1996 to over $435 million in 2000. “Columbia Engineering had some great classes, all taught by professors - not grad students. As an undergraduate, I had access to graduate-level courses, which were great - both inside and outside SEAS. The entire New York City experience was high-energy, which fit my personality.

“Columbia education was very relevant to my career. The methodology and mindset which I developed at Columbia - almost regardless of which specific engineering major - is exactly the kind of thinking needed and valued by engineering firms.”

Donald E. Ross, who is returning to the Engineering Council, is a retired partner from the mechanical and electrical engineering consulting firm of Jaros, Baum & Bolles. Mr. Ross has served as the president of the Columbia Engineering School Alumni Association and is presently on its Board of Managers.

During his professional career, he was president of the New York Association of Consulting Engineers and Vice Chairman of the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat. He has been elected to the National Academy of Engineering for the design work that he has completed on projects throughout the world that are part of the built environment.

“The thing that I value most concerning my Columbia education, beyond the technical training I received, is the heavy exposure that Columbia provided in matters beyond the technical. I took a large number of liberal arts courses in my three years in the College, which I strongly believe gave me an advantage over my peers in my professional career. If nothing else, it gave me a head start on being able to articulate ideas. I have always considered that as an invaluable advantage to me in life. The excellence of my education allowed me to participate in the design of engineering projects throughout the world that are among the finest examples of the built environment. I have always believed that a well conceived and executed mechanical design in a building is a thing of beauty just as a well designed facade is an artistic achievement to an architect.”

Alan Silberstein is President of Allston Associates, a firm that offers management services to large corporations and emerging enterprises particularly in the financial services industry. In 2000-2001, he was President and Chief Executive Officer of Western Union and Executive Vice President of First Data Corporation, its parent. During his stewardship, revenues grew at an annual rate of 18% to $2.7 billion. He is also a former Chairman and CEO of Claim Services at Travelers Property Casualty Insurance, where he was responsible for restructuring this critical function through the merger of Travelers’ and Aetna’s PC businesses.

“Columbia! The breadth of the Columbia experience—leadership opportunities in extracurricular activities, core curriculum in the liberal arts, as well as the depth and breadth of my engineering education. In all these respects, I learned ‘how the world works’ and gained the confidence to believe that I should, could and would make a difference in the world. When I worked as an engineer, I found most of my peers from other schools had far less lofty aspirations. I have found that the analytical rigor and the ability to anticipate results based on a combination of practical experience and abstract principals have proven useful in every pursuit.”

Providing Direction for SEAS's Future