The Digital Family Outstanding Achievement Honor is bestowed annually upon a person whose leadership, technical innovation, business acumen and community involvement have made a significant impact on Southern California’s digital media community.
Selected by members of the Digital Family community, the Outstanding Achievement Honor recognizes those exceptional individuals whose achievements have impacted our local economy, advanced our community and inspired our collective vision for what is possible in the greater technology and business communities.
Digital Family ’14 Outstanding Achievement Honor
Presented to
Chet Pipkin
In recognition of extraordinary contribution to the Southern California technology and business communities.
Biography
Chet Pipkin is the Founder, Chairman and CEO of Belkin International based in Playa Vista, in the heart of Los Angeles. In his parents’ garage in the early 1980s, he founded what became Belkin International and its three distinct brands, Belkin, Linksys, and WeMo. Fast Company recently named Belkin one of the World’s Most Innovative Companies in the Internet of Things (IoT). The Belkin team’s people-centric approach to IoT innovations and Belkin’s passion for delightful user experiences anchor the company’s successes. Today Belkin is a leading brand in the technology and consumer electronic sectors, and has offices in more than 20 countries around the world.
Belkin is a multiple-time Inc. 500 (fastest growing privately held companies in the United States) company, has been named a Los Angeles Technology Fast 50 Company 9 times, and has made the LA Business Journal’s list of the 100 fastest growing privately held companies 6 times in a row. The company has won many awards for design and innovation. Chet has been a three-time finalist in the Los Angeles Entrepreneur of the Year Awards, winning the Southern California Regional Award in 1996. He was inducted in the Dealerscope Magazine’s Consumer Electronics Hall of Fame in 2006. He was awarded the “Lifetime Still Achieving” award from the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce in 2013.
A husband and father of seven, Chet’s extensive nonprofit work revolves around youth, education, and closing the achievement gap. He is a founder of the DaVinci family of charter schools in Hawthorne, CA. The schools include a campus for STEM, Design, Communications, and a new model for K-8 education. He was also instrumental in planning Internet access to all California public schools as a member of the California Education Technology Task Force.
- Watch Amanda Coolong of TechZulu’s video interview with Chet Pipkin here
- Read BWWGeekWorld.com’s article about Belkin’s Founder/CEO, Chet Pipkin, receiving the Digital Family Reunion’s 2014 Outstanding Achievement Honor here
Past DFR Outstanding Achievement Honor recipients have included Nolan Bushnell (2008), Scott Painter (2009), William Quigley (2010), Eric Pulier (2011), Jim Jonassen (2012) and Ken Rutkowski (2013).