CAMBRIDGE – Gururaj Deshpande, co-founder of Sycamore Networks and Cascade Communications, who has earned three degrees from institutions in his native India or Canada, but none from MIT, and his wife Jaishree, a physicist and computer programmer, have announced plans to provide $20 million to finance a new Center for Technological Innovation at MIT. The center will be called the Deshpande Center for Technological Innovation. In announcing their plans at a ceremony at MIT, Deshpande said, "MIT stands for excellence," adding with tongue in cheek, "MIT has gotten less arrogant and is accepting that non-MIT guys may be able to help them out," The Boston Globe reported. The Deshpandes’ gift is among the largest single donations in the university’s history, though overshadowed by the $350 million pledged last year by International Data Group founder Patrick J. McGovern for a new brain research center.
