Mitchell C. Hill Endowment

Mitchell C. Hill was a true titan of the technology industry with an adventurer’s spirit and an athlete’s competitive drive. Mitch grew up in Southern California and graduated from Cal Poly Pomona with a B.S. in Economics. With much vision and foresight, Mitch enrolled in numerous computer information systems courses as he was fascinated by the impact technology was to have in the business world. This would later inform his career as a technology consultant and senior partner at Arthur Andersen (now Accenture). In 2000, he became the founding CEO of Seattle-based technology services firm, Avanade, a joint venture between Accenture and Microsoft. Under Mitch’s leadership, Avanade grew to be a billion-dollar company with nearly 10,000 employees worldwide. In retirement from Avanade, he enjoyed advising a number of technology start ups in the Pacific Northwest, most recently as CEO of Opscode (now Chef). Prior to his passing, Mitch was selected as a Cal Poly Pomona Distinguished Alumni, accepting the award posthumously on April 25, 2014.

Although Mitch passed away far too soon, his leadership and legacy will live on with the Mitchell C. Hill Memorial Endowment, which will fund the Mitchell C. Hill Center for Advanced Business Information Technology. The endowment will also support student scholarships and education in the fields enterprise mobility, cloud-based infrastructure, managed services and virtualization. The Computer Information Systems Department endeavors to raise $2.5 million, ensuring the spirit of Mitch’s work continues to thrive and live on through generations of future business leaders.

For more than three decades, Mitchell Hill was a leader in the technology field in the Seattle area. He served as chief executive officer of both Opscode Inc., an enterprise software startup company, and Avanade, a technology services joint venture between Accenture and Microsoft, and was responsible for launching Avanade in 2000. He was also managing partner for Accenture’s electronics and high-tech business in the Western United States.

During his long and respected career, Hill also served as an advisor to a number of technology startups in the Pacific Northwest. All of these endeavors followed his graduation from Cal Poly Pomona in 1980 with a B.S. in economics minoring in computer information systems.

A Southern California native, Hill’s leisure pursuits extended to cycling, water sports, karate and spending time with his family. Hill, who lived in Bellevue, Wash., is survived by his wife of 34 years, Cherie, and two sons, Mitchell and Matthew.