Lonnie S. McMillian was a visionary serial entrepreneur who led a series of companies aligned with telecommunications and biotech – and helped make Alabama a home for innovation.
His interest in tech was sparked while studying radar technology as a member of the United States Marine Corps during the Korean War. After the war, he attended Georgia Tech, where he earned a degree in electrical engineering in 1955. He then embarked on a wide-ranging career in electronics that included co-founding a computer manufacturer, Systems Engineering Labs, joining SCI in Huntsville as chief engineer, and working at Universal Data Systems as vice president of engineering.
In 1985, he co-founded ADTRAN, a telecommunications firm, which today is one of Huntsville’s largest non-public employers.
While the beginning and middle of McMillian’s career was in the tech and telecommunications sectors, the latter portion was in biotechnology, an area in which he had developed a passion for. In 1993, he was introduced by a mutual friend to Jim Hudson, who ran Huntsville-based Research Genetics. Following his retirement from ADTRAN in 2001, he and Hudson founded the non-profit HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology in 2005 to bring together experts in genetics, education, and entrepreneurship to accelerate innovation in the field. The Institute opened its doors in 2008 and quickly got to work.
By July 2017, its economic impact stood at $1.8 billion. The team of scientists in its genomic medicine division has discovered genes responsible for breast cancer and ALS, otherwise known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, and have given answers to those with undiagnosed or misdiagnosed diseases. Researchers in its genome sequencing center are busy analyzing the genetics of our food crops to discover insights that may make them more productive or resilient to drought.
Furthermore, HudsonAlpha has an extraordinary outreach and education arm that, among many different initiatives, brings genomics into the classroom to inspire future innovators or offering free genetic testing for cancer risk to North Alabama residents. All told, over 5.5 million people have been positively impacted by the Institute’s efforts.
McMillian was a generous philanthropist and lived out his commitment to improving the human condition through the support of educational, scientific, and other charitable causes.
In 2014, he was recognized by the Economic Development Partnership of Alabama with its lifetime achievement award for his career-long commitment to innovation and work to advance the state of Alabama.
Along with his degree from Georgia Tech, he graduated from Presbyterian College with a bachelor’s degree in business administration.
McMillian passed away in December 2018. He is survived by Helen, his wife of 64 years, daughters Barbara, Emily, and Sue, five grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.
