Ronald Arthur Stordahl is the founder of electronic component distributor

Digi-Key Digi-Key is a privately held American company that distributes electronic components. Headquartered in Thief River Falls in the U.S. state of Minnesota, the company is the fourth largest electronic component distributor in North America and the ...

Electronics, located in

Thief River Falls, Minnesota Thief River Falls, sometimes referred to as Thief River or abbreviated as TRF, is a city in Pennington County in the northwest portion of the U.S. state of Minnesota. The population was 8,749 at the 2020 census. Thief River Falls is the county ...

. He previously served as chief executive officer but is now member of the board.

Early life

Ronald was born in Thief River Falls to Arthur Vernon (1909–2011) and Ina (Olson) Stordahl (1922–2020) in 1943. His paternal grandfather, Louis, was an immigrant from

Flesberg Flesberg is a municipality in the traditional and electoral district Buskerud in Viken county, Norway. It is part of the traditional region of Numedal. The administrative centre of the municipality is the village of Lampeland. The economy of ...

Buskerud Buskerud () is a former county and a current electoral district in Norway, bordering Akershus, Oslo, Oppland, Sogn og Fjordane, Hordaland, Telemark and Vestfold. The region extends from the Oslofjord and Drammensfjorden in the southeast to Hardan ...

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...

Career

Stordahl's interest in

ham radio Amateur radio, also known as ham radio, is the use of the radio frequency spectrum for purposes of non-commercial exchange of messages, wireless experimentation, self-training, private recreation, radiosport, contesting, and emergency communic ...

provided the springboard for what became Digi-Key Electronics. While in college he assembled and began selling a digital electronic keyer kit for sending

radiotelegraph Wireless telegraphy or radiotelegraphy is transmission of text messages by radio waves, analogous to electrical telegraphy using cables. Before about 1910, the term ''wireless telegraphy'' was also used for other experimental technologies for t ...

code for

operators. It was called the Digi-Key. After obtaining his PhD in

Electrical Engineering Electrical engineering is an engineering discipline concerned with the study, design, and application of equipment, devices, and systems which use electricity, electronics, and electromagnetism. It emerged as an identifiable occupation in the l ...

from the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Tw ...

, Stordahl returned to his hometown of Thief River Falls. The keyer kit was discontinued and he began selling electronic components in 1972. Digi-Key Electronics has become one of the fastest growing electronic component distributors in the world. The privately held company has annual sales of over $3 billion and employs over 4,000 people. Stordahl holds the amateur radio callsign AE5E.

References

External links

* Living people University of Minnesota College of Science and Engineering alumni American chief executives American company founders Amateur radio people 1943 births {{US-CEO-stub