PMC-Sierra – The importance of innovation, adaptability and resilience
The importance of innovation, adaptability and resilience.
This is the first in a new Pender Ventures podcast series reflecting the scale-up stories of some of the great Canadian technology companies.
We kick off with the story of PMC-Sierra, a pioneering and leading semiconductor chipset supplier that specialized in the design and development of integrated circuits for networking, telecommunications and data storage.
Maria Pacella, Managing Partner of Pender Ventures sat down with three key executives and co-founders, each of whom made significant contributions to the semiconductor industry, Greg Aasen, Kevin Huscroft and Colin Harris.
They look back on the critical phases of PMC-Sierra’s evolution, the strategic decisions made by leadership, its impact on the broader tech landscape, navigating 2000, and what they’d do differently if they had to do it all again.
Key Takeaways
| [01:27] | How the team was formed and PMC-Sierra was founded. |
| [08:19] | Remembering the inflection point when the company hit upon the right tech solution and the industry and customers discovered it. How did they manage the demand? |
| [14:37] | Being ahead of the competition – how did the company manage to lead the pack? |
| [19:01] | The question of funding, having money in the bank and answering to the board. |
| [26:34] | PMC’s reverse takeover of Sierra and gaining a public listing. |
| [28:32] | Jumping forward to the late '90s - what was going on for the company during the tech boom and after the bubble burst? |
| [32:47] | How did PMC-Sierra navigate the crash; what strategic decisions did the team have to make? |
| [38:28] | Some of the key milestones and achievements that led to the eventual acquisition by Microsemi. |
| [41:19] | Looking back, what were some of the lessons learned along the way or things you would have done differently? |
| [44:43] | Anything you’d pass along to the new cohort of entrepreneurs? |
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