Josef Kates

Josef Kates, born Josef Katz, (May 5, 1921 – June 16, 2018) was a Canadian engineer whose achievements include designing the first digital game-playing machine, and the world's first automated traffic signalling system.

Early life and education Born the fifth of six children in an Austrian-Jewish family, Josef Kates was the son of Baruch (Bernard) and Anna Katz (née Entenberg). His parents ran a grocery store and an import-export business in Vienna. Kates fled to Italy to escape the Nazis after the Anschluss in 1938 and then, in 1939, joined the rest of his family which had fled to England. Kates enlisted in the British Army but, before he could see service, he and other Germans and Austrians resident in Britain were interned as enemy aliens. Kates was deported to Canada where he remained interned for almost two years until he and most of his fellow Jewish internees were recognised by the government as "victims of Nazi aggression" and released. At the camps in New Brunswick and Quebec, Kates fished, worked as a lumberjack, knitted socks and studied for his high school diploma through McGill University's high school matriculation program, placing first in Quebec's province-wide exams.

He was educated at Goethe-Realschule (Vienna: 1931–1938); McGill University (Montreal: 1941, junior and senior matriculation); University of Toronto (Toronto: 1944–1948, Honours in Mathematics and Physics; 1948-1949: M.A. in Applied Math; 1949-1951: Ph.D. in physics). and was built using a special electron tube, the Additron Tube, which Kates had invented. With the advent of transistors, which were much smaller and required less power, the tube was not put into commercial use.

Kates founded and became the President of KCS Ltd in Toronto between 1954 and 1966, which merged with the consulting arm of Peat, Marwick, Mitchell & Co. to become Kates, Peat, Marwick & Co. in Canada, with other corporations in the US and the UK, for which he acted as a co-managing partner. Kates was also chairman, CEO and director of Teleride Sage Ltd. (1977–1996),

His wife, Lillian Kroch, died of cancer in 1993 after almost 50 years of marriage. In 1995, Kates married his second wife, Kay Hill. 1993: Chancellor Emeritus) Medal from the Engineering Institute of Canada (1970) Julian Smith Medal (1977) Engineering Institute of Canada (1990: Fellow) Canadian Association of Management Consultants (1994: Fellow) Doctor of Mathematics (DMath) (University of Waterloo) (2005) Member of the Order of Canada (2011) Intelligent Transportation systems association of Canada Lifetime achievement Award, 2013

Organizations Mount Sinai Hospital (Toronto) (member of the Board of Governors) Technion University, Israel (member of the Canadian Board) Donalda Club (Toronto) Canadian Board of the Weizmann Institute (Israel)