Own and operate an educational consulting unit for middle & high school students studying abroad in North America.

Own and operate two branches located in Seoul that specialize in English education.

NDA was another venture-funded start-up opportunity that I really enjoyed. They did Verilog-based timing verification for semiconductor companies. NDA was ahead of its time!They had the Min-Max Verilog Simulator or Range Simulator, which used histogram to track and catch faults traditional single-mode simulators weren't capable of catching and provided probability of the fault happening. The tool was brilliant, but it had a Achilles Heel: the min-max simulation was just darn slow! ASIC Foundries loved it, but we spent a lot of time optimizing for speed and minimizing memory.I was involved in all parts of the operations: R&D, debugging, testing, technical liaison, technical support, etc. Everything I did was fun. I have lots of fond memories while working for NDA.

CDA was a spin-off start-up from VLSI Technologies, Inc., which was a foundry. I used this opportunity to move from Columbia, MD, a small quaint town to Silicon Valley, CA. I joined the team to develop a VHDL simulator.I got involved in the architectural phase and helped define the tool, then with the front-end of the tool with user interface, user-level command, etc. Unfortunately, the actual engine development, which I was interested in, happened in Europe so I couldn't get any exposure. This is where I developed Carpal Tunnel Syndrome, a debilitating condition for software engineers.The project went bust. Soon, I left the company to join another exciting start-up: Nextwave Design Automation.

After earning my MS in Electrical Engineering doing High-Level Synthesis for Pipelined Systems, CLSI was my second job. CLSI was developing a HDL-based EDA tool for IEEE Std 1076-1987 VHDL within the IEEE 1076 work Group (VASG) sponsored by DoD.I was hired to develop a VHDL high-level synthesis tool, but in addition to doing high-level synthesis, I ended up helping out in many areas such as compiler, Verilog translator, software language specification for standardization, toolset development, testing, etc. This is where I got hooked on small companies where I could contribute in many functions. It was really interesting period.CLSI was bought by Compass Design Automation, a subsidiary of VLSI Technologies, Inc located in Silicon Valley.

This was my first job after graduating from college. An exciting opportunity in the midst of tough economy. I was in a CPU group headed by Jim Guyer whose name was mentioned in a Pulitzer Prize winning non-fiction book, "The Soul of a New Machine" by Tracy Kidder, which talks a Data General Engineering R&D team working to build the next generation computer to compete with VAX by Digital Equipment. My job was to write micro-code for assembly instructions.After a few years, I realized that hardware engineers were a dying breed soon to be replaced by software. I worked for a CAD team and started doing 3rd party EDA tool evals and deployment. Then I got interested in software. I was introduced to Verilog Simulator by Gateway and a new up-and-coming company named Synopsys. Eventually, I quit to go back to school.