From the July 7 Forbes article that mentions Wind River, Jerry Fiddler discusses his newfound wealth:
>>>"What if it all goes away? I count on that," says Fiddler, the lanky academic who is cofounder and chairman of Wind River, a maker of operating system software for embedded systems. Wind River is the Microsoft of code that runs on your car's engine computer, for example, or in some piece of medical equipment. Wind River's Tornado software also powers Oracle's upcoming network computer. "History shows that lots of people lose it, so learning to count on assets is a big mistake. I live in a better house, but it is four blocks from my old house. I drive a better car, but not that much better. For the most part, having money has only complicated my life."
Like nearly every other rich person in this story, Jerry Fiddler didn't start his company to get rich. "I was at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and getting tired of government work. My background was in music -- I was trained as a composer. I wanted to have more personal freedom, and I wanted to do some computer music, which back then you had to do by first building the computer. So I started a consulting business that would allow me to get some gear. But somehow I never did any computer music. Instead, I built a company." <<<
Anyone notice that both Forbes and Fortune think that Tornado is the RTOS? I suppose this isn't that important, since VxWorks isn't a consumer brand. |
