''My math teacher helped me to discover and make sense of math. Before that, I was terrible at it,'' she says. ''After this 'math discovery,' everything just started clicking. Once I excelled at math, I became interested in science, chemistry, and other subjects that required math skills. From there, I went from aspiring to be a flight attendant to being the first Chinese woman to win the Nobel Prize in mathematics. I had big dreams for a fourth grader!''
By the time she had reached her junior year in high school, Lo’s family made the life-changing move from Taiwan to the United States. This change wrought more challenges than Lo had bargained for, though this ultimately helped her shape her future goals.
''I was great at math but wasn’t very good with subjects like history, English, or geography,'' she says. ''But because my dad is an electrical engineer, I was familiar with it, and I had some talent at math, I chose engineering as my major at UC Irvine.''
It was during her time at UC Irvine that Lo underwent a third life-changing experience, finding a mentor in one of the field’s most accomplished experts during her junior year who fostered not only her interest in engineering, but served as a mentor in her education.
''I had an excellent school advisor, Professor James H. Mulligan, who later was my doctoral advisor,'' she says. ''He was my first real mentor and actually introduced me to electrical engineering. He helped me get very excited about learning about becoming an electrical engineer. He guided me throughout the rest of my school career, and I stayed in touch with him until he passed away a few years ago.''
The IEEE Education Medal was renamed in 1999 as the James H. Mulligan Jr. Education Medal in his honor,'' Lo noted. ''He had a huge influence on me. I ended up getting my bachelor’s, master’s, and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from UC Irvine.''
While studying engineering, Lo found her university to be both academically and socially invigorating, satisfying her desire to learn while simultaneously providing her with opportunities to establish connections and to build the beginning of her career.
''I’m glad I chose UC Irvine,'' she says. ''It was a fairly small school when I attended with classes of about 15 students. It was great for personal interaction with the teachers and other students. I was in one association at UC Irvine, the Chinese Association. When we weren’t studying, we went dancing together on Friday nights.''
''I had an internship during the process of getting my Ph.D. which really helped to confirm what I wanted to do,'' she continues. ''I was in the analog design group at Rockwell International, where I worked on simulation and layout on some analog circuitries that actually went into production later on.''
After obtaining her degrees, Lo soon found work in a multitude of industries where her expertise expanded beyond the standard engineering requirements, allowing her to work in what were then nascent fields of technology.
''I worked at Ford Aerospace (which was later acquired by a large government contractor), where I was working on algorithm development — more mathematics and system work than implementation.''
''After receiving my Ph.D., I went to Hughes Aircraft in Torrance, California, where I was exposed to RF technology, but not at the cellular level,'' she continues. ''From there, I went to work at Texas Instruments (TI) in the hard disk drive business unit.''
''My boss at TI went on to start up a Maxim Design Center in Irvine, so I and two coworkers went to work there for him designing transmitters and receivers for SONET applications,'' she recalls. ''Maxim was my first experience at working in a startup environment. Going from three large companies to working at Maxim was a good experience, all the way down to setting up the office and shopping for equipment and supplies at Costco!''
As is often the case with a professional opportunity, at this time, one came knocking from her past.
''One day, a former Hughes coworker called me and said that his current company, Sequoia Communications in San Diego, was looking for qualified engineers,'' she explains. ''It sounded like a great opportunity to work with an innovative startup. I also looked at other companies in the San Diego area, but none of them were on the cutting edge of RF technology compared with Sequoia. This pretty much helped to make up my mind and I joined the company in 2001.''
''I really love working at Sequoia Communications,'' she affirms. ''The work environment is very homey and we’re all very close, like a family. It’s very challenging work that has also provided me with the ability to advance and grow in my career.''
Among her most memorable accomplishments, Lo lists her work that has both brought the most widespread influence on the market and which challenged her the most professionally — sometimes with unexpected results.
''I’m proud of all of our accomplishments, but I’m particularly thrilled with the work our team did on our first multi-mode chip, the SEQ5400, which we brought to market in 2005,'' she says. ''I was the chip lead on the SEQ5400 project, and it was especially challenging in many ways. It was the first integrated transceiver chip to come out on the market with nonconforming architecture that everyone in the industry said could not be done.''
''We were a much smaller company back then, but the teamwork on the project was incredible,'' she continues. ''We spent an enormous amount of time on it together in the process. Once we got to tape-out, we worked day and night to get it done. I’d walk around at midnight, and half of the staff was still in the office. We proved out the topology first, but basically, everything had to be built from scratch. We built every circuit from the ground up. It was a lot of work and was done with just nine designers. The whole project took about 15 months from beginning to end including layout and verification. Once the chip went to tape-out, the feeling was just incredible — almost euphoric.''
''There were also lessons to be learned from this project. The SEQ5400 was our first chip. We tried to get everything that we could into the SEQ5400, but in certain areas, it didn’t meet performance specs,'' she recalls. ''In the second chip revision. we were able to get in more detail work. The topology was already there, and we were able to polish it in the SEQ7400, which we are getting ready to bring to the market now. Because our system topology is so different from other companies, and people kept saying we couldn’t accomplish it with our methodology and architecture, it was especially satisfying and gratifying that the project was a success. We proved everyone wrong.''
Lo’s success in the industry has been facilitated by an admitted abundance of positive role models and mentors, all of whom inspired her to both work harder and dream bigger.
''I’ve been very fortunate in that all of my bosses have been great. My first real mentor was Professor James H. Mulligan, my doctoral advisor at UC Irvine,'' Lo says. ''My previous boss at TI and Maxim, Jim Arelis, reinforced James Mulligan’s idea that I can do whatever I want to do.''
''The bosses after Jim have all been similar, but John Groe, chief technology officer at Sequoia Communications, is probably the most visionary person I’ve ever met,'' she compliments. ''John took the motto of believing in oneself to a whole other level. But, he also reinforces not to be afraid, to take chances and to find ways to accomplish what you want. It’s an important credo to live by in a startup environment. The lessons I’ve learned from my college advisor, previous, and current bosses have been invaluable to my career and have helped me to get to where I am today.''
For aspiring engineers searching for their big career break, Lo promotes the idea of self-actualization through self-analysis, an idea that entails the fundamentals of the way professionals view themselves on a professional and personal level. According to Lo, the recipe for success is contingent upon the fulfillment of the following:
- You have to believe in yourself.
- You’re the only one that limits yourself.
- You need to have self-confidence in yourself and what you do.
- You must love what you do.
''If you’re not sure about which engineering specialty to choose (mechanical civil or electrical),'' she says, ''talk to people already working in the field and see what they think. The internship I held at Rockwell International while I worked on getting my Ph.D. really helped me to confirm and reaffirm what I wanted to do — to be an engineer in the RF wireless design and development industry. If you’re still in school, go to your career center for information. I would definitely recommend that you try out your career of choice with a summer internship.''
''There’s a great deal of opportunity for both women and men in the field of engineering,'' she continues. ''Most companies only care about how good you are, not whether you’re a man or a woman. At least that’s our motto at Sequoia Communications!''
| Q. What do you do for fun? A. Shopping,going out to dinner,getting together with family and friends,playing the piano. Q. What CD is in your CD player right now? A. Clay Aiken,but you’ll find a mix of classical and rock music on my iPod. Q. What is the last magazine you read? A. People. Q. What is your favorite TV show? A. I have two: 24 and Heroes. Q. Who is your role model? A. Professor James Mulligan. He inspired me to get my Ph.D. Q. What makes you laugh? A. Silly movies, comedy shows. |
