At the center of Wang Laboratories’ phenomenal growth is Harvard-educated physicist Dr. An Wang, a schoolteacher’s son and Chinese immigrant. An inventor, at age 28, Dr. Wang developed the magnetic core, which was the key to computer memory technology for more than 20 years. Almost single-handedly, he guided his fledgling Wang Laboratories from its origin, filling special customer needs for one-of-a-kind products (including the first digital scoreboard) to its place today as the United States’ largest minority-held corporation with 12,000 employees.

In 1964, Dr. Wang introduced one of the first desk-top electronic calculators. Then, with his non-stop innovative style, he wisely shifted the company’s efforts onto small computer manufacturing, a decision that led him to develop the first microprocessor controlled video word screen.

Already listed as one of the nation’s top 1,000 industrial companies by Fortune magazine, Wang Laboratories controls 35 percent of the world market in word processing equipment and dominates the competition in integrated information systems.

Dr. Wang’s steady leadership and remarkable business perception have steered Wang Laboratories away from glutted markets and into expanding industries with almost magical skill. Wang Laboratories ranks fifth in per-share earnings growth among the top-growth U.S. companies, according to Financial World. Profit growth has exceeded 75 percent annually for the past five years, and total revenues for fiscal 1979-80 leaped 60 percent from the previous year, to $544 million. Dr. Wang is expanding operations in the complex system and minicomputer fields, and predicts the company’s annual sales will surpass $1 billion by 1983 and $5 billion by 1990.

Dr. Wang’s entrepreneurship also extends to the field of education. He is founder of the Wang Institute, a graduate program for software engineers – an outgrowth of his lifelong interest in education.