​​​Stanley Mazor

Innovator

San Francisco State University

Before there was silicon in Silicon Valley and back when a successful "start-up" meant that your car turned over, Stanley Mazor was a San Francisco State math major intrigued by the university's only computer—an IBM 1620. A state-of-the-art machine in those days, the IBM 1620 was more than 1,000 times slower than today's computers and it was known as a "CADET" which either stood for "Computer with Advanced Economic Technology" or "Can't Add Doesn't Even Try." Nevertheless, Mr. Mazor recalls being "bitten by the computer bug" as he learned to program the most advanced pieces of technology that SF State owned at the time.

Mr. Mazor acquired his love of computers at San Francisco State and found the love of his life as well, his wife Maurine. In 1964, when he left campus, it was inconceivable that on a typical day in 2014 there would be as many as 75,000 computers operating at SF State. Indeed, today computers have become as indispensible to the educational enterprise as they have to the broader world around us, and Stanley Mazor's innovation was at the core of these revolutionary changes.

In just his first few years as a programmer, Mr. Mazor had already co-patented a high-level computer, but it was when he joined Intel in 1969 that he and his colleagues revolutionized computing with the design and architecture of the first commercially available microprocessor, the Intel 4004. Identified as the marriage of the other two great human inventions, language and the wheel, the microprocessor moves language and ideas at an ever-increasing pace. This singular innovation has transformed the way we work, the way we play and the way we learn.

Mr. Mazor is the recipient of many honors for his contributions in the field of computer science including the Ron Brown American Innovator Award and the Kyoto Prize. In November 2010, he and his former Intel colleagues received the National Medal of Technology and Innovation. The medal, presented by President Obama, is the highest U.S. award given to scientists, engineers and inventors. He is a member of the National Inventor's Hall of Fame and SF State's Hall of Fame.

In recognition of innovation that so profoundly extended human capacity, the Board of Trustees of the California State University and San Francisco State University are proud to confer upon Stanley Mazor the honorary degree Doctor of Science.