Andy Hopper joins lowRISC CIC Board as Independent Chair

Today, we are delighted to announce that Professor Andy Hopper, CBE FRS FIET FREng, has joined the lowRISC Board of Directors as Independent Chair.

“I’m delighted to be joining lowRISC CIC,” said Prof. Hopper, speaking today from Cambridge UK, “As digital systems pervade every aspect of our lives trust and transparency become crucial. An open source approach allows for public inspection of the principles and implementations being used. I believe the future of digital systems will be underpinned by not for profit organisations that provide design transparency and enable real innovation. I am putting all my weight behind lowRISC because it is an indispensable component of our digital world.”

Professor Hopper, Treasurer and Vice-President of the Royal Society and Professor of Computer Technology at the University of Cambridge, is a pivotal figure in the UK technology scene. He was the Research Director of Acorn Computers from 1979-85, during which period the pioneering ARM1 RISC processor was developed¹, and headed up the world-renowned Cambridge University Computer Lab between 2004 and 2018.

Cited as one of the UK’s leading practicing scientists, Professor Hopper also has deep connections within the business community, having co-founded thirteen spin-outs and start-ups, three of which have subsequently been taken public. In recent years, the companies he helped create have received five Queen’s Awards for Enterprise.

The lowRISC board looks forward to working with Professor Hopper to grow lowRISC CIC’s engineering and executive team, deepen our relationships with new and existing partners like Google, and maximize the positive global impact of open source silicon design in a variety of high value target applications.

¹ ARM itself was subsequently spun out in 1990.

Dr Robert Mullins, lowRISC Director and Co-Founder