Ryal Poppa Has Died

Ryal Poppa, former Chairman, President and CEO of Storage Technology has died in Manhattan Beach, Calif.

storagetek_ryal_poppa

Joining the Company in 1985 during the dark days of Chapter 11, he lead the company to achieve the fastest, largest turnaround in industry history, emerging from Chapter in 1987. He retired in 1996.

Honors include:
1991 – Colorado Business leader of the year. CU Service Medal for StorageTek’s contribution to the Athletic Center and the Women’s Engineering Center. He also served on President Reagan’s Committee on the National Medal of Science.

Ryal graduated from Claremont McKenna College in 1957 as a scholarship student. In 1980 he began his support of the college by founding the Poppa Computer Lab – contributed to the establishment of ‘WI FI’ throughout the campus and this year endowed the Ryal Residential Lab.

He leaves his wife of 56 years Ruth Ann, daughters Sheryl Tobelmann (Ralph) and Kim Jagd. Grandchildren Allison (NMU 06)and Alex Griffing (CMC 08); Nikki (UCLA 09) and Ryal Jagd (UCLA 11).

An STK colleague, Fred Moore writes: “…I am so sorry to hear this. I knew he was struggling with his health and fought it with all he had. I’m sure you know he was the best CEO boss/mentor/motivator I ever encountered in the business world and the 8 years I sat next to him shaped my career to this day and parts of my life to a great deal. He stands alone as a leader in my eyes and I’m sure you are proud of his many achievements. It was my great privilege to have worked for him“

He continues to be a mentor to researchers and medical students at UCLA.

Comments

Following several mistakes in trying to design an IBM compatible mainframe and to develop optical disc drives and libraries, StorageTek filed for Chapter XI in 1984.

Poppa, formerly CEO and COB of BMC Industries, replaced co-founder Jesse Aweida in 1985. He began as sales manager for IBM and then filled executive positions at Commercial products, Mohawk Data Sciences, Triumph-Adler, Pertec Computer. He was also for a while at the board of Maxtor.

Under the new Poppa's management, StorageTek focused on big tape libraries and encounters a tremendous success, as Big Blue didn't really believe in this kind of robotics.

His successor at StorageTek in 1996, CEO Pat Martin, seems to try essentially to get the company profitable to sell it. In August 2005, Sun purchased StorageTek for $4.1 billion in cash.

We had the chance to meet Poppa for an exclusive interview mid-1995 in the paper version of StorageNewsletter, and we remember an intelligent and smart guy.