EDA industry to raise funds for cancer research

The industry is throwing the event in honor of Chronologic (Synopsys' VCS) and Forte Design founder John Sanguinetti, who suffers from the treatable but yet incurable disease.

Multiple myeloma begins as bone cancer and attacks the immune system. According to the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation, approximately 45,000 people in the United States live with the disease and an estimated 14,600 new cases of multiple myeloma are diagnosed each year.

Organizers said Sanguinetti's current prognosis is three to four years but there is an emerging "cocktail of drugs" approach that should enable patients to live with the disease - just as this approach has enabled HIV patients to continue to live a fairly normal life.

"Unfortunately, with the current level of research funding, it is expected to take five years for this new approach to become effective, which would be too late for John," said organizers. "If we can raise additional funds for targeted research to key research scientists, we can help accelerate the research benefiting John, and all other myeloma sufferers."

The event--which is open to anyone in the EDA and IC industries, including press and venture capitalists--requires a minimum donation of $200. The fundraiser includes live bluegrass and comedy by the Sibling Brothers as well as food and networking.

The fundraiser will also feature a "Live auction" hosted by EDA industry Gadfly John Cooley. Numerous items will be auctioned off including dinner with Mentor chairman Wally Rhines, dinner with Synopsys chairman Aart de Geus, dinner with EE Times editors Richard Goering and Brian Fuller and separately a meal cooked and served by yours truly and Gartner Dataquest analyst Gary Smith. Other items reportedly up for auction include cases of wine, a block of San Francisco Giants tickets, and "nVidia technology."

The fundraiser will be held at Capital Club Athletics in San Jose at 5:30 pm on Wednesday, September 15th.

To attend, please RSVP via email to edacharity04@yahoo.com.

You can send in an instant donation at http://myelomasource.org/get_involved.htm.

Please include "EDA Charity" in the message box so that we can track our total dollar amount. And bring your receipt at the door as your entry ticket.