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The Goff Smith Prize is the highest external honor bestowed by the University of Michigan College of Engineering. Its intent is to recognize universal high achievement in science and engineering that justly serves as an inspiration to the College community.

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Bill Joy (BSE CompE '75, DEng Hon. '04) presented the 2009 Goff Smith lecture on Thursday, October 15, 2009. Watch the lecture video.

About the Speaker

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Bill Joy co-founded Sun Microsystems, and designed and wrote Berkeley UNIX—the backbone of the Internet. Bill's many contributions were recognized in a Fortune cover story which called him the "Edison of the Internet."

At Sun, as chief scientist he led the company’s technical strategy for two decades. He was a key designer of Sun technologies, including Solaris, SPARC, chip architectures and pipelines, and Java.

In 1995 he installed the first city-wide WiFi network. He has more than 40 patents issued or in progress.

Since 2005 he has been a partner in the greentech practice at the venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB) where he has helped establish the greentech practice and its strategy of funding game-changing technologies broadly addressing the problems of climate change and sustainability. KPCB has a broad greentech portfolio of about 50 ventures which are innovating in areas such as wind, solar and thermoelectric power generation; low-cost electrical energy storage; renewable fuels and green chemicals from non-fuel sources; low-embodied-energy materials; energy efficient electronics; and many others.

He has a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the University of Michigan, a master’s degree in computer science from the University of California, Berkeley, and an honorary PhD in engineering from the University of Michigan. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and is a trustee of the Aspen Institute.

About Goff Smith

Goff Smith served his College and University with distinction for over 70 years. As president of the Class of '38E, he was instrumental in creating the 1938E Award, bestowed annually to an outstanding junior faculty member.

Mr. Smith spent his entire business career with Amsted Industries of Chicago, rising from sales representative in 1946, to chairman and chief executive officer in 1980. He established and served as a trustee of the Amsted Industries Foundation. He was influential in directing support toward many educational institutions, including the University of Michigan.

He received a bachelor of science in engineering degree in 1938 and a master’s degree in business administration in 1939 from the University of Michigan. He also received a master’s degree in industrial management from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Mr. Smith made many contributions to the University of Michigan and was recognized with a Sesquicentennial Award in 1967, a Presidential Societies Leadership Medal in 1989 and the College of Engineering Alumni Society Distinguished Service Award in 2000. He died in December 2008.