Ajay Bhatt

In honor of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, every school day The Cardinal will feature a prominent and historical Asian American or Pacific Islander, living or dead, who has worked toward change, advancement, and/or world peace. Some of them are heroes, and some are unsung heroes, who deserve recognition, and have made a contribution to society.

Danna Gallegos, Staff Writer

May 15, 2026

Ajay Bhatt is an Indian-American computer architect. He was born on September 6, 1957, in Gujarat, India. He has made a massive contribution to the world of technology.

Bhatt completed his Bachelor’s of Engineering in 1980 from Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda, India, and then later received his master’s degree from the City College of New York, United States.

Bhatt first joined Intel in 1990 as a senior staff architect on the chipset architecture team in Folsom. He was inspired to create the USB when his daughter was having difficulties connecting a home printer to a computer. He pitched his idea to many tech companies, including Apple and Microsoft, but Intel was the only one that believed in him. In 1994, Bhatt and his team at Intel created the Universal Serial Bus. The Universal Serial Bus was absolutely revolutionary for its time. Although Intel has the patent for the USB, they chose to keep it royalty-free. Bhatt agreed with their decision.

“I don’t do these things for money, I did this to bring about change, and it’s not very often that somebody gets a chance to bring about this big a change.”

He has worked in the computer industry for over 38 years and has been a part of the Intel team for 25+ years. Bhatt is currently the Chief Client Platform Architect at Intel. He currently has over 132 US and international patents. He has led and co-invented several major technological innovations, such as the accelerated graphics port, the Thunderbolt, and the USB Type-C.

Bhatt has been honored with many awards. He was the winner of the 2013 European Inventor Award in the non-European countries category. He received an achievement in excellence award for his contribution in PCI Express specification development in 2002. In January 2025, he was honored with the Padma Shri, which is India’s fourth-highest civilian award.

About the Contributor

Danna Gallegos, Staff Writer

Danna Gallegos is currently a senior in the AHHC academy at Hoover High School. She was born on September 17 and is 17 years old. She has always been excited about turning 17 as it is her golden birthday! She was born in San Diego alongside her older brother and younger sister, making her the middle child. She has a three-year-old dog named Oso, who is mixed with an Australian Shepherd and Border Collie. She also has a three-year-old cat named Lucki. She loves both of them very much and definitely wants to get more pets in the future. This school year, Danna wants to make sure she stops procrastinating and gets to her classes on time while also having fun during her final year here at Hoover. She is excited to go to college, but also extremely nervous at the same time. She hopes to become a radiology technician and make her parents proud. Her parents are her biggest role models and motivation. In her free time, she enjoys listening to music and watching movies. Her current favorite artists are Lana Del Rey, Esha Tweari, and Bôa. Her favorite song is “Mystery of Love” by Sufjan Stevens. Her favorite movie is Rise of the Planet of the Apes. She also enjoys hanging out with her friends outside of school. She has always been interested in traveling, and hopes to travel around the world at some point. One of her top places to travel to first is Paris, as she has heard many positive things about it from her cousin, who has already been there.