Technology >> CEO Interviews >> April 19, 2004
FRANK MANNING is President and Chief Executive Officer of Zoom
Technologies, Inc., a $33 million NASDAQ-listed company that is a
leading producer of dial-up and broadband modems and related products.
Mr. Manning earned his BS, MS and PhD degrees in Electrical Engineering
from MIT, where he was a National Science Foundation Fellow. His PhD
thesis and a patent described a way to make self-repairing computers and
other electronically repairable machines out of low-cost 'cellular
arrays' of identical chips interconnected on a semiconductor wafer. Mr.
Manning co-founded Zoom in Boston in 1977. He designed the electronics
and microprocessor firmware for the popular Demon Dialer, which entered
production in 1981. Zoom began shipping modems for personal computers in
1983, and Zoom's products are now marketed under the Zoom, Hayes and
Global Village names. Mr. Manning was also a Director of MicroTouch
Systems, a world leader in touchscreens, from 1993 until MicroTouch's
acquisition by 3M in 2001. Since 1998 Mr. Manning has been a Director of
Massachusetts Technology Development Corporation, a public purpose
venture capital firm that invests in early-stage Massachusetts
technology companies. Profile
TWST: We would like to begin with a brief historical sketch of thecompany and a picture of the things that you are doing at the present
time.
Mr. Manning: We started in 1977 and I am one of