SAN FRANCISCO -- Robert (Bob) Gardner, a longtime EDA executive and a former director of the EDA Consortium (EDAC) trade group, died Apr. 11 after a short illness.

He was 74.

Gardner served as the executive director of the Electronic Design Automation Consortium (EDAC), now the Electronic System Design (ESD) Alliance, from 2007 until 2015. He cofounded Missing Link Electronics in 2008 and was its president and chief operating officer at the time of his death.

Gardner was a director at Verific Design Automation since its inception in 1999. In 2016, he was presented with the DATE Fellow Award by the Design Automation and Test in Europe (DATE) Conference and Exhibit in recognition of his long association with EDAC and DATE.

Over hus 50-year career, Gardner held senior management positions at semiconductor and EDA companies including Signetics/Philips, AMD, Exemplar Logic, Design Acceleration, Bridges2Silicon, and ITeX. A 1965 graduate of California Polytechnic College in Pomona, he earned a bachelor's in electrical and electronics engineering.

He is survived by his wife, two children and four grandchildren.

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