Netscape founder gives $150 million to Stanford
Entrepreneur Jim Clark, who founded Netscape Communications, Silicon Graphics, and Healtheon, donates $150 million to Stanford University to fund a biomedical engineering initiative.
Stanford University said yesterday that Clark's donation is the largest single gift in its history since the founding grant. The contribution will help build the James H. Clark Center for Biomedical Engineering and Sciences, a 225,000-square-foot facility that will become home to approximately 400 scientists and technicians.
The donation will also help provide equipment for the new facility, generate positions for faculty who will participate in the new initiative, and fund graduate student fellowships.
Clark said that while he was a Stanford professor in the early 1980s, he was allowed to develop a computer chip called the geometry engine that became the basis for his first venture, Silicon Graphics. Clark also founded MyCFO.com, an online financial management service, where he serves as chairman of the board.
The program in biomedical engineering and sciences known around campus as "Bio-X" was initially a grassroots effort among faculty to integrate basic and applied sciences to develop new therapies and cures for human disease. Over the last 18 months, the concept has been formalized, the university said.