I was constantly inventing things as a child, especially electronic things. Without my parents’ permission, I took apart a transistor radio and built a “rain alert” that turned on a light if it started raining. Much to my displeasure, though, I wasn’t as successful with the robot I built to vacuum my room—it never quite worked!
Despite this natural inventive drive, like many kids of the sixties and seventies, I longed to be in a rock band. And in high school, that’s what I did. Engineering didn’t seem to be the career for me because I didn’t want to do a lot of math. However, I did build various audio amplifiers and light controls for our band.
I went to college for three-plus years but never graduated and avoided electronics engineering classes. Little did I expect my electrical inquisitiveness and enjoyment of music would lead me to where I am today—president of Applied Science Inc., the manufacturer of HemoFlow Blood Collection Systems and other solutions for blood banking needs. Two different requests years apart led to my present occupation.
The first occurred in 1975 when I was working in a music store. Someone came in wanting a lighting system to correlate with his band’s music. From past band experience, I knew I could do this and helped set up the “Shake Your Booty” club. I used standard logic gates and some triacs and then installed all the underfloor wiring and conduits.
Shortly thereafter, someone else wanted a system for a live music club. I discovered the wonders of the microprocessor (8080 and 6502), and the club owner and I formed Nicholson Electronics to sell one of the first computer-controlled stage lighting systems. After several years of 80-plus-hour weeks, the business failed. Although the business was lost, I had gained tremendous experience and became a programmer for Atari (games). Note that I did it with only a degree from the school of hard knocks.
I spent seven years doing future product research for Atari, but Atari never used any new ideas and laid everybody off in 1984. I immediately contacted people I knew at Richdel, the makers of irrigation systems. As a consultant, I became the primary irrigation controller designer of the 1980s. I formed Alpine Engineering as a consulting company and designed many products ranging from toys to Lionel train controllers to medical pumps for almost 18 years.
But after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, the consulting business went down the tubes. Fortunately, I had formed Applied Science in 1991 in Grass Valley, Calif., to design and manufacture pumps and other electromechanical medical devices for pharmacies and hospitals.
The next major event came in 1998. Again, someone was seeking a particular product. A manufacturer’s rep was having trouble creating an inexpensive bloodflow monitor for blood banks. He shared his frustrations with a Microchip sales rep who knew our skill with medical technology. The product was simple for a small company to design, and it appeared that there was a viable niche market. Hundreds of blood banks could use it. We were only a two-person company then. Today, we have eight employees and our HemoFlow blood monitor products are used in over 30 million blood collections each year around the world.
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