Interview with Thomas A. Tombrello - Caltech Oral Histories

Tombrello–95
wouldn’t have asked me to come and meet with him if he hadn’t already made the same decision.
It was just putting a dot over the “i.”
Euan’s a very bright man. When he became chairman, he said something that people
should have taken more seriously, which was, “If I’m still in this job in ten years, you people
have made a dreadful mistake.” He stayed in the job fifteen years, and he bought his own
version of Fairchild and lost probably $5 billion. Being in a job too long—and I’m speaking for
term limits here, because they exist for the reason that when you’re in a big job for a long time,
you’re cut off from your sources of real information. People don’t tell you the truth anymore,
and if they do, you don’t like hearing it and you don’t believe it. Euan was absolutely right,
except when his time came, after ten years, he still thought he had more time going.
But anyway, I was given a chance to go there, and I was negotiating. I flew up to Palo
Alto, because Michel Guilloud, who had run the lab when I first started consulting there, was
staying up there for something or other. Baird came in and we met to talk about the details of
running the lab. They wanted to cut the lab’s funding back. In 1985, 1986, they had been
spending probably $42 million a year on it. He said, “I suppose you have an idea of what you
want for a budget.” I said, “Euan, I’ll tell you something. I will make you an offer you can’t
refuse. You will tell me how much you’re willing to spend to run research. And then I will tell
you what I can give you for that much money.” I said, “That’s the best I can do. You probably
have an idea in your mind about how much you want to spend, and then I will tell you what I can
do with it. However, when we agree on a number, it is absolutely fixed. You cannot start
playing around with the number. After six months you cannot tell me, “Oh, I’d like to cut you
back some more.” He says, “Oh, this is the most refreshing thing I’ve ever heard in my life. It’s
a pleasure to do business with you.” I said, “Keep in mind there’s a caveat. You can’t play with
the number. You get to choose it—it’s your number—but then it’s my money.” And I said, “I’m
not going to try to do this in a vacuum. You’ve been in this field longer than I have. You and I
will negotiate on what the mix of projects will be and that kind of thing. We are going to make
sure we agree on what we do, but we’re not going to change the money.” And so he says, “$30
million.”
ASPATURIAN: Just like that?
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