California State University, Fullerton’s business school has received a $30 million donation,the largest gift for the school.
Steven Mihaylo, a 1969 Cal State Fullerton grad and founder of Arizona’s Inter-Tel Inc., made the donation, which ranks among the largest charitable gifts in Orange County.
In 2004, Mihaylo gave $4.5 million to Cal State Fullerton’s College of Business and Economics.
“To be thrilled is an understatment,” business school Dean Anil Puri said Thursday.
Mihaylo said he hopes the gift encourages other Cal State Fullerton graduates to give back to the school.
The money is set to go toward recruiting professors, creating chairs, providing scholarships and developing programs at the business school.
Cal State Fullerton’s $87.5 million business school, funded in part by Mihaylo’s original gift, is set to be completed next year and named Steven G. Mihaylo Hall.
Mihaylo’s original gift sparked some debate on campus as business students brought up Inter-Tel’s $8.7 million in mail fraud and antitrust fines that surfaced under Mihaylo, who wasn’t accused of any wrongdoing.
His latest gift ranks among the largest in OC.
In 2005, Hot Pockets inventor Paul Merage gave $30 million to the business school at the University of California, Irvine.
UC Irvine’s engineering school bears the name of Broadcom Corp. cofounder Henry Samueli after he gave $26 million in 2000 to the department and to the College of Medicine.
Donald Bren, chairman of The Irvine Company, has made several big donations to UCI, including $20 million for a law school last year.
Separately, UCI said Thursday it received $30 million for a telescope project, including $10 million from Microsoft Corp. founder Bill Gates.
The Charles Simonyi Fund for Arts and Sciences provided $20 million.
The money is for UC Irvine’s work on the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope project, which is working to build a telescope with a digital camera to study the solar system.
