John Tu (; born August 12, 1941) is a

Chinese-American Chinese Americans are Americans of Han Chinese ancestry. Chinese Americans constitute a subgroup of East Asian Americans which also constitute a subgroup of Asian Americans. Many Chinese Americans along with their ancestors trace lineage from m ...

billionaire businessman and philanthropist. He is the co-founder of

Kingston Technology Kingston Technology Corporation is an American multinational computer technology corporation that develops, manufactures, sells and supports flash memory products, other computer-related memory products, as well as the HyperX gaming division ...

Early life

John Tu was born in Chongqing, China. He was the son of an official in China's Nationalist government. He moved to Shanghai with his parents in 1945, before going to Taiwan two years later as the Chinese civil war neared the coast. John felt totally lost at school. He describes himself as a mediocre student unable to attend the best Chinese colleges. Therefore, John moved in 1960 to Germany. He wanted to study electrical engineering, but John didn't know how to speak German. He knew how to speak a few sentences in English. So after several weeks, he went out on the street to find someone who spoke English. A biker led him to a priest who had lived in China, and sent him to a language school in

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...

. In Germany at that time, a two-year apprenticeship was required for everyone, so he worked at a shipbuilding factory. After working there for two years, he studied electrical engineering at the Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology of the Technische Hochschule Darmstadt in Germany and graduated in 1970. He then went to work for

Motorola Motorola, Inc. () was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, United States. After having lost $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009, the company split into two independent public companies, Motorol ...

Wiesbaden Wiesbaden () is a city in central western Germany and the capital of the state of Hesse. , it had 290,955 inhabitants, plus approximately 21,000 United States citizens (mostly associated with the United States Army). The Wiesbaden urban area ...

, Germany. In 1971 he moved to California.

Career

In 1982, he co-founded Camintonn with David Sun. in 1986, they sold it for $6 million and founded

. In 1996, they sold 80 percent of the company to

Softbank is a Japanese multinational conglomerate holding company headquartered in Minato, Tokyo which focuses on investment management. The Group primarily invests in companies operating in technology, energy, and financial sectors. It also runs the Vi ...

for $1.5 billion, before buying it back in 1999 for $450 million.

Philanthropy

In 2021 Tu made a donation to the Western Iowa Journalism Foundation that enabled the Pulitzer Prize-winning Storm Lake (Iowa) Times to buy its local competition and a weekly in an adjoining county. He has supported

Erin Gruwell Erin Gruwell (born August 15, 1969) is an American teacher known for her unique teaching method, which led to the publication of ''The Freedom Writers Diary: How a Teacher and 150 Teens Used Writing to Change Themselves and the World Around Them ...

's Freedom Writers and the Freedom Writers Foundation. In 2011, he donated $1.2 million to give every first year medical student at

UC Irvine UC may refer to: Arts and entertainment * '' University Challenge'', a popular British quiz programme airing on BBC Two ** ''University Challenge (New Zealand)'', the New Zealand version of the British programme * Universal Century, one of the t ...

iPad The iPad is a brand of iOS and iPadOS-based tablet computers that are developed by Apple Inc. The iPad was conceived before the related iPhone but the iPhone was developed and released first. Speculation about the development, operating ...

Personal life

He is married with two children and plays drums with his band, JT and California Dreamin'.

References

Living people American billionaires American computer businesspeople American electrical engineers American philanthropists Chinese emigrants to the United States Businesspeople from California People from Rolling Hills, California Businesspeople from Chongqing 1941 births Technische Universität Darmstadt alumni Chinese expatriates in Germany {{Taiwan-business-bio-stub