UW ECE alumna Thy Tran (BSEE ‘93) is the Vice President of Global Front-End Procurement at Micron Technology, a worldwide leader in the semiconductor industry. She started from humble beginnings as a Vietnamese refugee in America, but she seized every opportunity this country offered — learning, growing, and using her electrical engineering degree from the UW to build a life defined by purpose, achievement, and service. Photo by Ryan Hoover / UW ECE
By Wayne Gillam / UW ECE News
What does it mean to live a good life — a rich, fulfilling life? This is a question many of us wrestle with at one time or another. For UW ECE alumna Thy Tran (BSEE ‘93), it is something she has pondered for years, not just in theory, but in the way she has chosen to live. Tran’s journey began with humble beginnings as a Vietnamese refugee, arriving in America with her family and little else but hope. She seized every opportunity this country offered — learning, growing, and using her electrical engineering degree from the UW to build a life defined by purpose, achievement, and service.
Tran stands with the Stanford Graduate School of Business Executive Program 2021 cohort after delivering the commencement address as the featured graduation speaker.
Today, Tran is the Vice President of Global Front-End Procurement at Micron Technology, a worldwide leader in the semiconductor industry specializing in computer memory and storage solutions. She stands among the world’s experts in the process technology development of dynamic random access memory, or DRAM, — a technology that powers countless electronic devices. Tran transitioned to her current role to learn more about the business side of semiconductors after serving as Vice President of DRAM Process Integration at Micron, where she led global teams across the United States and Asia, driving technology development and transferring advanced DRAM into high-volume manufacturing fabrication facilities. Her career spans more than three decades, with experience in the U.S., Europe, and Asia, including pivotal leadership roles at two semiconductor fabrication startups.
Tran’s academic journey did not end at the UW. She is a recent alumna of the Stanford Graduate School of Business’ Executive Program and the McKinsey Executive Leadership Program. She is a senior member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, or IEEE, and a member of the Society of Women Engineers. Tran was the honored guest speaker for UW ECE’s 2025 Graduation Celebration and serves on the UW ECE Advisory Board. She is a strategic advisory board member for the International Semiconductor Executive Summit and Mercado Global, and a recipient of the Global Semiconductor Alliance’s 2023 Rising Women of Influence award. Tran will join the Micron Foundation Board of Directors in 2026. She is also an inventor holding seventeen patents and an entrepreneur who started small businesses of her own while working full time.
Tran with her husband, Chris, and children, Maila and Thoren, in Paris, France in 2022.
Beyond her professional accomplishments, Tran is a mother of two, a real estate investor, traveler, avid art and book lover, and a collector. Her passion for literature spans from modern fiction and poetry to English and Russian classics. Her personal library is a testament to her lifelong pursuit of knowledge and intellectual enrichment. By nearly any measure, she has achieved a life that is rich and fulfilling, and she has always managed to keep people — family, friends, colleagues — at the heart of her journey.
“I don’t define myself solely as American, Vietnamese, or an immigrant. My roots are in the people who have stood by me — my family and closest friends,” she said. “They are my foundation, the ones who keep me grounded. And for the past 20 years, my husband’s unwavering support has been my anchor through the toughest moments. At the same time, I know my life isn’t just about me. It’s part of something bigger — a network of connections and experiences that have shaped me in ways I never imagined. Every relationship, every shared moment reminds me that we’re all interconnected. Because in the end, success isn’t defined solely by what you achieve — it’s also measured by what you empower others to accomplish.”
These are the basic facts about Thy Tran, and they are impressive. Many at the UW and throughout the semiconductor industry know of her business acumen, her vast network, and her multicultural insight. But what is less well-known is the long, arduous journey she undertook to reach where she is today.
A refugee from Vietnam
A photo of Tran holding her refugee number sign after arriving at a Thailand refugee camp in 1979.
Tran’s father served as a colonel in the South Vietnamese military, fighting alongside U.S. forces during the Vietnam War. After the war ended, he was sentenced by the North Vietnamese government to 10 years in prison for his collaboration with the U.S. military. Recognizing the precariousness of their situation, Tran’s family decided to escape Vietnam in 1979, four years after the fall of Saigon. Tran was just 11 years old. With currency unstable, the family traded their life savings for gold bars to buy passage out of the country — a risky and complex endeavor. After two failed escape attempts, their third try was successful. Tran, her mother, stepfather, older sister, two younger brothers, and cousin boarded a boat bound for Thailand in the dead of night.
But their ordeal was far from over. The ocean was fraught with thunder, lightning, and violent storms. Armed pirates boarded their boat twice, robbing and assaulting passengers. After four days and three harrowing nights, Tran and her family arrived at a refugee camp in Thailand. There, they slept in a large tent shared with other families on the beach alongside other refugees, provided with only the barest necessities. Many found the camp to be a harsh new reality, but Tran saw it through a different lens.
“I remember the sand—smooth and white, like flour.” she recalled. “I watched the trees tilt and sway in the wind, taking it all in—the nature, the beauty—choosing to focus on that instead of the harsh reality of people surviving on bare necessities and in poor living conditions.”
Tran with her mother and sister, Linh, in Vietnam.
Tran’s family received sponsorship from her aunt in the U.S. after a year in the refugee camp. In immigration law, sponsorship is a legally binding contract to provide financial support, ensuring newcomers will not become a public burden. Tran and her family moved from Thailand to El Paso, Texas, where they began the process of adjusting to a new culture and way of life. Tran studied English as a Second Language, or ESL, quickly becoming a translator for her family. She still remembers her first trip to an American grocery store, marveling at the beautiful, shiny fruit that was so perfectly organized. She also recalled the kindness and cruelty she encountered.
“I remember a lot of things. For instance, other kids making fun of me because I looked different, had an accent, and could not communicate well, or later being told to go back to where I came from,” she said. “But I also experienced the kindness of strangers. Looking back, all the kindness far surpassed those bad memories.”
After a year in El Paso, friends of the family who owned a restaurant encouraged the family to move to Seattle. There, Tran’s stepfather, once a lawyer in Vietnam, reskilled as an electronics technician. Her mother, a former teacher, worked in their friend’s restaurant as a cook, and later other temporary jobs. While working, she went to nursing school to get her degree as a registered nurse. She eventually held two full-time nursing jobs for fourteen years. Tran’s mother also gave birth to two more daughters in Seattle, bringing the number of children in the family to six.
Tran with her sister, Linh, on a beach in Vietnam.
While both parents worked, the children pitched in to help. Tran began by delivering newspapers, and soon her mother and siblings joined, managing six paper routes together. She proudly recalled earning an award from The Seattle Times for outstanding service. As she grew older, Tran balanced multiple jobs—working at McDonald’s, a community center, and even a funeral home. She also taught karate, worked as a camp counselor and receptionist, and, alongside her older sister, helped care for her younger siblings. She said these experiences fostered independence and maturity. Though her journey from stranger in a foreign land to proud American was marked by hardship, Tran said she remembered it as a magical time because she was with her family through it all.
Tran is descended from strong women who valued education. Her mother was the first woman from her village to attend a university, and her grandmother was the first girl from her village to go to school. With this lineage, it is no surprise that Tran excelled academically.
“I was always good in math and science, and they put me in the Alpha Mentor program for gifted students when I was in sixth grade,” she said. “My English was weak, but I still stood out academically. I was part of the math Olympiad and French team competitions, and we did well and received several trophies.”
Throughout high school, Tran took every opportunity she could to get involved, including playing varsity volleyball and cheerleading as well as becoming tennis captain and debate club president. Outside of school activities, she studied karate and earned her second-degree black belt, taught karate during high school and college, and even took home some trophies from the Western Regional Championship women’s competitions.
“Those recognitions taught me that success depends on your determination, effort, and abilities — not where you come from or your place in society,” she said.
From UW student to semiconductor expert
Throughout high school, Tran took every opportunity she could to get involved, including playing varsity volleyball and cheerleading, as well as becoming tennis captain and debate club president. Tran was a high school homecoming queen and was involved in a number of activities outside of her classes, including studying karate and earning her second-degree black belt. (far right) Tran during the UW Kappa Delta Sorority Pledge Week 1988.
Tran excelled in junior high and high school, advancing several grades in math. She originally aspired to become an artist, but her talent in math and science, coupled with her family’s financial need, led a school counselor to advise her to pursue engineering. Tran took the advice, was accepted into the UW, and attended the University on a full-ride scholarship.
She flourished at the UW, joining the Kappa Delta Sorority and serving as scholarship chairman and Kappa Delta class president. She applied herself diligently to rigorous electrical engineering studies. She also took courses in philosophy and English literature to broaden her horizons. Yet, during her first years of undergraduate study, she struggled with regrets about giving up art, which made her engineering studies more challenging.
“To me, the best part is more about enjoying the journey — the friends you meet and the deep bonds you form, how you get there and how you grow and learn along the way.” — Thy Tran, UW ECE alumna (BSEE ’93)
Tran was among several industry leaders at the 30th Anniversary of the Global Semiconductor Alliance Awards, where the GSA rang the closing bell at the NASDAQ Stock Market on November 14, 2024.
Everything changed the summer of her sophomore year, when she took a solo backpacking trip across Europe. The trip opened her eyes to art, architecture, history, and a world full of possibilities. She realized that to travel and immerse herself in rich, cultural experiences, she needed to be able to support that lifestyle. Rather than continuing to worry about “selling out,” she decided to embrace electrical engineering and her natural talent in math and science, recognizing that this was the ticket to living her best life. This mindset shift changed everything.
“For me, mindset can determine skill set,” she said. “If you have the right mindset — mental toughness, perseverance, and tenacity — the skill set is easier to acquire.”
After returning to the UW, Tran’s engineering studies began to come easily to her. She took a semiconductor physics course at UW ECE that became an inflection point. Tran said she found it fascinating, and as she called it, “the magic of semiconductors” landed her an internship at IBM, setting the stage for her future career.
A leader in DRAM technology
Micron’s HBM4 is a third-generation, high-bandwidth memory cube, an example of Micron’s industry products enabled by DRAM technology. This product is designed to accelerate next- generation AI platforms by providing higher speeds, increased capacity, and better power efficiency.
Tran’s first job after graduation was at Motorola in Austin, Texas, working on process technology for microprocessors and static random access memory, or SRAM, as a device engineer. After three and a half years at Motorola, her curiosity and desire to explore the world led her to Siemens, where she joined the company’s International Technology Transfer Management team. Tran played a key role in the ProMOS semiconductor manufacturing fab startup — a joint venture between Siemens and Mosel Vitelic — transferring DRAM technology from research and development to manufacturing.
“To me, the best part is more about enjoying the journey — the friends you meet and the deep bonds you form, how you get there and how you grow and learn along the way,” she said. “It’s also about taking stock of the path you are on, your efforts, your resilience, and the people who helped you or inspired you.”
From 1996 to 2008, Tran worked in the United States, Europe, and Asia, leading innovative and entrepreneurial projects. In 1997, she was part of the WaferTech startup team, a company now known as TSMC Washington in Camas, Washington. Two years later, she returned to Siemens, which spun off Infineon in Richmond, Virginia. At Infineon, which later spun off to Qimonda for the Memory sector, Tran advanced to the Technical Ladder Program as Principal Engineer and Overall Integration Leader. In 2004, she relocated to the company’s memory research and development headquarters in Dresden, Germany, to lead DRAM technology node development.
A silicon wafer containing hundreds of microchips produced by Micron.
In 2008, Tran joined Micron, where she thrived and rose through the ranks—leading DRAM module development programs that included advanced capacitor, metallization, and through-silicon-via (TSV) process integration—before assuming the role of DRAM Process Integration node lead for several technology generations. Tran later oversaw teams across the U.S., Taiwan, and Japan. Her technical contributions and leadership have been pivotal to Micron’s DRAM technology development, helping the company achieve industry leadership in DRAM technology.
Tran is a steadfast innovator. Her inventions and patent disclosures have advanced semiconductor fabrication techniques, enabling more efficient and reliable memory devices. Her work has addressed critical challenges in miniaturization and performance optimization for modern electronics, including low-capacitance interconnect structures, advanced planarization techniques, and vertically integrated DRAM architectures. Collectively, her innovations have pushed the boundaries of semiconductor scaling, enabling smaller, faster, and more power-efficient consumer electronics.
“To continue scaling DRAM technology, we must keep pushing the limits of physics. That means being creative and innovative—finding new ways to enable the next generation of memory. It also requires making tough, sometimes risky decisions: setting the right strategy, balancing incremental improvements with disruptive changes, and ensuring robust risk mitigations to cover all bases.”
Tran was the recipient of the Global Semiconductor Alliance’s 2023 Women of Influence award. She is pictured here at the award celebration with Micron’s CEO and executives.
Tran is also a fearless leader who knows how to motivate her team and stand up for them when needed. When she joined Micron, the company was behind its competitors in DRAM development. Tran rose through the ranks, assuming more leadership roles and responsibilities. Before long, she was leading the company’s DRAM Process Integration organization in Technology Development. Micron went from fast follower to industry leader within a few DRAM generations. Tran believes that a winning mindset was key to her team’s success, just as it had been for her as a UW undergraduate.
“Yesterday’s best is not good enough for tomorrow. So, you must be maniacal, and drive with a ‘what is possible’ mindset instead of just doing what you can to get by,” she said. “I always say, ‘go big or go home.’ Sometimes we bet wrong, but if you mitigate the risk, you will still come out on top — that is part of strategic and technical leadership.”
A lifelong learner
Tran was the honored guest speaker for UW ECE’s 2025 Graduation Celebration, and she serves on the UW ECE Advisory Board. Her nephew was in the 2025 graduating class, and three generations of Tran’s family attended the ceremony. Photo by Tara Brown.
Tran was invited to be the honored guest speaker for the UW ECE 2025 Graduation Ceremony. At the event, she noted that her nephew was in the graduating class, and she was visibly moved when speaking about her family. Three generations of Tran’s family attended the ceremony. All six of her siblings graduated from the UW, as did three nieces and her nephew. In total, they are, according to Tran, “10 proud Huskies!”. Through talent, determination, and the support of family, friends, and colleagues, this former Vietnamese refugee and her family, which now includes doctors, engineers, a researcher, and an economist are making significant contributions to America and society.
“I felt deeply humbled and grateful to be invited as the honored speaker. To me, it is a testament to the University’s values, reflected in the speaker profiles UW ECE chooses to showcase,” she said. “For me, it was a true homecoming, and it just filled my heart with tremendous pride and joy.”
Tran is focused on giving back to the next generation through mentorship at both the UW and Micron. She has served on the UW ECE Advisory Board for several years, bringing industry experience, insights, and connections to maximize opportunities for students and faculty. She is working with UW ECE to set up semiconductor fabrication facility site visits and is coordinating with Micron’s design and products team to provide more opportunities for students in the UW ECE Engineering Innovation and Entrepreneurship, or ENGINE, capstone program. At Micron, Tran has been the executive sponsor for the Women Leadership network, or MWLN, for several tenures and an active mentor for multiple programs, including MWLN, the Technical Leadership Program, Micron Young Professionals, and the Global Mentorship Program for external university students. She is a popular mentor with a long wait list of mentees.
“I felt deeply humbled and grateful to be invited as the honored speaker. To me, it is a testament to the University’s values, reflected in the speaker profiles UW ECE chooses to showcase. For me, it was a true homecoming, and it just filled my heart with tremendous pride and joy.” — Thy Tran
In October 2025, Tran delivered the closing keynote — Dream Big. Live Large. Give Back. — at the Society of Women Engineers’ WE25 conference in New Orleans, leaving thousands of attendees deeply moved. Tran received a standing ovation and sparked a wave of LinkedIn posts celebrating the power and authenticity of her story. Her message went beyond inspiration, igniting meaningful conversations about courage, leadership, and the limitless possibilities ahead.
And she continues to be a lifelong learner.
(left) Tran on the day of achieving the rank of second-degree black belt in karate while at the UW. (right) Tran’s oil-on-canvas study — an homage to French Post-Impressionist painter Paul Cézanne, painted during her art school days.
Over the years, Tran has studied painting and printmaking at Virginia Commonwealth University, rare books at the University of Virginia, and explored other martial arts, including Kung Fu and Taekwondo, even while working as a full-time engineer. Her passion for knowledge and new experiences continues today. Recently, she was accepted into UC Berkeley’s full-time master’s degree program in information and data science, with an emphasis in artificial intelligence (AI). Tran says Micron and her own organization within the company have ambitious AI roadmaps with numerous initiatives underway. She felt that if she understood data science and AI at a deeper level, she could more effectively lead and coach her team. She also said that it is simply exhilarating to learn new things.
“I don’t do things only because they are necessary to advance. I choose the hard things because they stretch me — technically, intellectually — and because in the long run, they broaden my knowledge and perspective,” she reflected. “I can hang with engineers and artists, literary geeks, food and wine enthusiasts, political junkies, and world travelers. Being well-rounded doesn’t just enrich my life, but also others’ — it helps me connect with others with diverse backgrounds to form meaningful and lasting friendships. Most people go through life anchored in a single version of themselves. Every challenge we embrace, every curiosity we follow, uncovers another layer of who we are and who we might become.”
Epilogue: The many versions of a life well-lived
Thy Tran’s journey is a testament to the power of resilience, curiosity, and the courage to embrace possibility. From a refugee camp in Thailand to the global stage of semiconductor innovation, she has lived out answers to the question: What does it mean to live a rich, fulfilling life? From Tran’s experience, it means embracing opportunity, lifting others as you rise, and never ceasing to learn and grow. Her story is not just about achievement — it is about transformation, about the many versions of ourselves waiting to be discovered, and about the beauty of building bridges across cultures and generations.
Tran with three generations of her extended family, attending her brother Phuc’s wedding in Jamaica in 2014.
See more photos of Thy Tran in this year’s issue of The Integrator magazine.