Mentor Graphics names new vice president

WILSONVILLE, USA: Mentor Graphics Corp. has named Serge Leef Vice President of New Ventures, tasked with expanding the company’s thrust into markets adjacent to electronic design automation. Leef will also continue his role as General Manager of the System Level Engineering division.

“Serge Leef has an excellent track record at Mentor of uncovering new market opportunities that build on Mentor’s existing strengths,” said Walden C. Rhines, CEO and chairman of Mentor Graphics. “Mentor’s expertise in system design gives it unique insight into bringing design automation to adjacent markets like automotive wiring and network design. This announcement reaffirms our commitment to continue to broaden the reach of the company beyond traditional markets using our systems expertise.”

Serge Leef’s new role builds on his experience in applying advanced system-level design automation techniques to the challenges associated with design, verification, implementation and test of heterogeneous systems frequently found in automotive, medical, aerospace and defense industries.

Prior to joining Mentor Graphics in 1990, Leef was responsible for design automation at Silicon Graphics where his team created revolutionary, high-speed simulation tools to enable design of 3D graphics chips that defined state-of-the-art in visualization, imaging, gaming and special effects for a decade.

Prior to 1987, Serge managed a CAE/CAD organization at Microchip Inc. From 1982 to 1987, he worked at Intel Corp. developing functional and physical design and verification tools for major 8- and 16-bit microcontroller and microprocessor programs. Serge holds a BSEE and MSCS from Arizona State University.