Eric Lidow, a photovoltaics whiz kid who fled Nazi Germany with $14in his pocket and went on to become a power-electronics pioneer andmultimillionaire philanthropist in the United States, died Jan. 18at the age of 100.
Lidow, in the course of a remarkable, storied life, roomed with LeonTrotsky's son, started two
major companies--Selenium Corp. andInternational Rectifier Corp.-- built a solar-powered vehicle riddenin by Vice President Nixon and was a major arts benefactor inSouthern California. In 2007,
EE Times honoredLidow with its Lifetime Achievement Award.
At the time, Lidow, then 94, still ventured into his modestcinder block office near LAX almost every day, driving his own hybridToyota Highlander, and wearing a suit, tie and ever-present broadsmile.
During a luncheon Q&A then at a favorite seaside Italianrestaurant, he ranged over the major electronics achievements he'dseen his life:
"The most practical one is the cellular telephone.It's made communication so easy. I'm very impressed by theadvances in computers, but there's a tremendous danger to oureducation because of the availability of computers and the placethey take in children's lives. They're spending too much time infront of the screen and not enough time with other people. Youdon't want Internet kids growing up to be antisocial, becausethat's what happening, I pity those people who try to getmarried on the Internet."
Lidow's career was remarkable not only because he worked every dayin it -- more than 60 years at IR alone -- but that he entered intoit in the first place.
Fleeing GermanyLidow was born Dec. 22, 1912 in Vilnius, Lithuania. As a young Jew, hemoved to Berlin in the 1930s, where the leading minds in mathmaticsand engineering were teaching and where Lidow would studyphotovoltaics and room with Trotsky's son. In 1937, he received hisEE from the Technical University of Berlin--his diploma studded withNazi swastikas. Shortly thereafter, he fled Germany with $14 in hispocket, a Leica camera and not a single word of English in hisvocabulary, arriving in New York in October of that year. In 1939,he moved across county to Los Angeles, where he founded SeleniumCorp., in 1940. At first the company made selenium cells forexposure meters, but when the business turned sour, the companyswitched to making novel rectifiers. Thanks to the company'sadvanced power electronics and some defense contracts, SeleniumCorp. prospered during World War II. Lidow sold it to Sperry Corp.in 1946.
The newly minted millionaire could have been content to retire youngand hob-nob with Hollywood stars and starlets, but instead he spentthe year working with the Red Cross to find his parents, Holocaustsurvivors, in Europe and bring them to America. The next year, heand his father, Leon, an ex-banker, started International Rectifier,which began by making selenium photoelectric cells and seleniumrectifiers. Lidow was CEO until 1995 and Chairman of the Board until2008.
Next: Power electronics innovation
