Paul E. Jacobs

Dr. Paul E. Jacobs is chairman of Qualcomm’s board of directors and the company’s chief executive officer. A leader in the field of mobile communications for nearly two decades and a key architect of Qualcomm’s strategic vision, Dr. Jacobs’ responsibilities include leadership and oversight of all the company’s initiatives and operations.

Through his technology innovations and advocacy, Dr. Jacobs spearheaded Qualcomm’s efforts to develop and commercialize mobile technology breakthroughs that have contributed significantly to the growth of both the Company and the industry. Important developments which began under Dr. Jacobs include: the first Palm OS®-based smartphone; inclusion of GPS capabilities in mobile phones (which led to the acquisition of SnapTrack™ and Qualcomm's development of gpsOne™ position-location technology); the Brew® system, which enables over-the-air downloading of applications using digital signatures to ensure the integrity of the content; the business ecosystem that enables Brew developers to engage operators globally and receive payment for their applications; MediaFLO™ technology for mobile TV; and mirasol®, an advanced reflective display technology.

Following the completion of his Ph.D. in 1989 and a year as a post-doctoral researcher at a French government lab in Toulouse, Dr. Jacobs joined the Company fulltime in 1990 as a development engineer leading the mobile phone digital signal processor software team. Five years later, Dr. Jacobs became vice president and general manager of the combined handset and integrated circuit division, which was subsequently divided into Qualcomm Consumer Products (QCP) and Qualcomm CDMA Technologies, respectively.

As an innovative leader of a broad range of technical teams within Qualcomm, Dr. Jacobs has been granted more than 35 patents for his inventions in the areas of wireless technology and devices. Dr. Jacobs chairs the World Economic Forum’s Future of Mobile Communications council, serves on the Board of Directors for A123Systems, and is a member of the Advisory Board of the University of California, Berkeley, College of Engineering; the Advisory Board of University of California, San Diego, Jacobs School of Engineering; and the Young President's Organization.

Dr. Jacobs received his bachelor's (1984) and master's (1986) degrees as well as his doctorate (1989) in electrical engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, and subsequently endowed the Paul and Stacy Jacobs Distinguished Professor of Engineering chair at the school. He is a member of the Phi Beta Kappa, Eta Kappa Nu and Tau Beta Pi honor societies.