SanDisk 2006 Annual Report Download - page 11

ensuing year or until their respective successors are duly elected and qualified. Each nominee has been recom-
mended for nomination by the Nominating and Governance Committee, has been nominated by the Board of
Directors for election and has agreed to serve if elected, and the Board of Directors has no reason to believe that any
nominee will be unavailable or will decline to serve. In the event, however, that any nominee is unable or declines to
serve as a Director at the time of the Annual Meeting, the proxies will be voted for any nominee who is designated
by the current Board of Directors to fill the vacancy. Unless otherwise instructed, the proxyholders will vote the
proxies received by them “FOR” the nominees named below. The seven (7) candidates receiving the highest number
of the affirmative votes of the shares entitled to vote at the Annual Meeting will be elected Directors of the
Company. The proxies solicited by this Proxy Statement may not be voted for more than seven (7) nominees.
NOMINEES
Set forth below is information regarding the nominees to the Board of Directors.
Name
Position(s) with
the Company Age
First Elected/Appointed
As a
Director
Dr.EliHarari(1) .................. Chairman of the Board, Director and
Chief Executive Officer
61 1988
Irwin Federman(2)(3) .............. ViceChairman of the Board and Lead
Independent Director
71 1988
Steven J. Gomo(2) ................. Director 55 2005
Eddy W. Hartenstein(4) ............. Director 56 2005
Catherine P. Lego(2)(5) ............. Director 50 2004
Michael E. Marks(3)(4) ............. Director 56 2003
Dr. James D. Meindl(3) ............. Director 73 1989
(1) Member of the Special Option Committee
(2) Member of the Audit Committee
(3) Member of the Compensation Committee
(4) Member of the Nominating and Governance Committee
(5) Ms. Lego served as a Director of the Company from 1989 to 2002 and returned to the Board of Directors in May
2004.
BUSINESS EXPERIENCE OF NOMINEES FOR ELECTION AS DIRECTORS
Dr. Harari, the founder of SanDisk, has served as Chief Executive Officer and as a director of SanDisk since June
1988. He was appointed Chairman of the Board in June 2006. Dr. Harari also served as President from June 1998 to
June 2006. Dr. Harari founded Waferscale Integration, Inc., a privately held semiconductor company, in 1983 and was
its President and Chief Executive Officer from 1983 to 1986, and Chairman and Chief Technical Officer from 1986 to
1988. From 1973 to 1983, Dr. Harari held various management positions with Honeywell Inc., Intel Corporation and
Hughes Microelectronics Ltd. Dr. Harari holds a Ph.D. in Solid State Sciences from Princeton University and has more
than 100 patents issued in the field of non-volatile memories and storage systems. In December 2006, Dr. Harari, along
with SanDisk’s co-founders Sanjay Mehrotra and Jack Yuan, received the 2006 IEEE Reynold B. Johnson Data
Storage Device Technology Award “For leadership in the development and commercialization of Flash EEPROM-
based data storage products.” Dr. Harari is a board member of Tower Semiconductor Ltd.
Mr. Federman has served as a Director of the Company since September 1988. Mr. Federman has been a general
partner in U.S. Venture Partners, a venture capital firm, since April 1990. Mr. Federman was President and CEO of
Monolithic Memories, Inc., a semiconductor company, from 1978 to 1987. Prior to serving as President and CEO,
Mr. Federman was the Chief Financial Officer of Monolithic Memories, Inc. Mr. Federman also serves as a director for
Check Point Software Technologies Ltd., a security software company, Mellanox Technologies, Ltd., a semiconductor
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