Henry Kressel

Henry Kressel (born c. 1934) is an American engineer, scientist, and financial executive.

In 1980, Kressel was elected a member of the National Academy of Engineering for pioneering research in opto-electronic devices with specific emphasis on semiconductor lasers.

He is a partner and the senior managing director of the private equity firm Warburg Pincus.

He has been a board member of SRI International since 2001.

Early life and education Kressel's parents and sister were murdered in The Holocaust during World War II, after which Kressel emigrated to the United States. He entered Chaim Berlin High School in 1947 and graduated in 1951.

Kressel earned a bachelor's degree in physics from Yeshiva College, a master's in applied physics from Harvard University, an MBA from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and a Ph.D. in material science, also from the University of Pennsylvania. He was in charge of development and commercialization of research developments in a variety of fields including light sources, light detectors, and integrated circuits. The development of the first practical laser diodes and the first epitaxial silicon solar cell are also attributed to him. He received the IEEE Centennial Medal in 1984 and the IEEE David Sarnoff Award in 1985 for "contributions to electronic devices". and is a Fellow of the American Physical Society.

In 2008, Kressel created a scholarship at Yeshiva University in his own name, the Henry Kressel Research Scholarship.

Patents and publications Kressel holds 33 United States patents and has published more than 120 papers. He has also published six books: