Telecom & software in south asia 8

Born in Karachi in early 1950’s , B.Sc Physics , Karachi; B.S Electrical Engineering , University of Texas , Lives in Irvine, California with family.

Value /Wealth created in 1980 - $ 300 million.

Safi Qureshi came to the U.S. in 1971 for education in engineering and worked in the Information technology industries of California for companies such as Documenter, Computer Automation, and Telfile Computer.

In 1980 he co-founded a garage-based company making personal computers. As a computer industry veteran Safi played a lead role in not only AST’s growth in emerging markets but in changing the PC industry from a narrow corporate enterprise into a global business . Due to Safi’s intense focus , vision [ that of evolving the digital age as a platform to develop tools that will further promote global & personal communication in all societies.], and passion for innovation AST earned a reputation in the PC industry as one of the foremost brand names. It was recently acquired in the mid 1990’s by Samsung Electronics.

Safi Qureshi has also been instrumental in commercial development around the world. He has traveled to countries such as China , Indonesia , Thailand, India , Pakistan with high level US trade delegations to sign several landmark agreements [ Intellectual Property Rights ].

He has participated in GATT, NAFTA, APEC issues, and is a strong proponent of education and reserach at University of California, Irvine [Bonney Center for Neurobiology of Learning & Memory]

Recently he was instrumental [ as member of President Clinton’s Export Council ] in ensuring that Clinton did go and talk to Pakistan military leaders in 2000. He is currently on the board of Directors of Focus Software International, Object Automation, NetInfo, IAFC.

His brainchild is the ALIF [ the first letter of the Hebrew, Arabic and Urdu alphabet] which is a televised series in the Urdu language of the Sesame Street series for Pakistan Television broadcast to the children in Pakistan. The programme has been broadcast from mid 1999 to 2000.

In his most recent project, Safi Qureshi is helping Pakistan with Information Technology efforts in becoming a major exporter of Software . He took with him in March 2001 two fellow members Kanwal Rekhi [ who sold his company Excelan to Novell ] and Dr. Kailash Joshi -- of the The Indus Entrepreneurs Group from San Jose ,California to meet the President of Pakistan and also the dynamic Minister for Science & Technology - Dr Ata-ur-Rehman. Later they also visited and had an interactive session at the Institute of Business Administration at Karachi.

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