He graduated with First Class honours in 1990, and was accepted to the Ph.D. program at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he studied Physical Chemistry and performed research into the growth of diamond films on metallic surfaces with Cynthia Friend.
In 1995, he accepted a post doctoral position at Bell Labs in Murray Hill, working in the group of Yves Chabal, in the Physical Sciences research laboratory, headed by Horst Stormer.
He studied the surface oxidation of silicon[3] and the science of wafer bonding[4] and splitting by hydrogen implantation, winning multiple awards for his work.
He was offered a position as a Member of Technical Staff in the Materials Research laboratory run by Alastair Glass, working for Mark Cardillo to study the microscopic physics and chemistry of sol-gel.
[7][8] During his roles as CTO and Bell Labs President he has engaged in numerous industry leadership activities such as the FCC's Open Internet Advisory Committee[9][10] and the launch of the European Union's Partnership for 5G Wireless Research.