Paul Merage, who created a cultural icon,and a fortune,by inventing Hot Pockets, is giving $30 million to the business school at the University of California, Irvine.
The donation is the largest in UC Irvine’s history. The school is renaming the Graduate School of Management as the Paul Merage School of Business in honor of the gift.
Merage has “a vision for the school the business community relates to,” Dean Andrew “Andy” Policano said on Wednesday.
That vision is to analyze economically significant trends in the global economy, technology, regulation and everyday life and work that into studies at the business school, Policano said.
That is what Merage did as cofounder of Colorado-based Chef America Inc., maker of Hot Pockets and other frozen foods. He and his brother, David Merage, sold the company to Nestl & #233; SA in 2002 for $2.6 billion.
“He’s a visionary, so innovative,” Policano said of Merage. “He really carefully analyzed the trends that affect people and the economy. He took advantage of the change that was taking place.”
The proliferation of microwaves led Merage to develop frozen snacks that could be made in minutes. Other trends helped propel Hot Pockets: more women at work, people eating on the run and “grazers” eating throughout the day instead of sitting down for meals.
The Business Journal estimates Merage’s wealth at $600 million. A native of Iran, he moved to Orange County after selling his company and now manages his family’s investments and charitable doings from here.
Merage is a member of the UCI Foundation and the business school’s board of directors. One of his charitable efforts is the Merage Institute Fellows Program, which sponsors immigrant students.
His donation is expected to help fund endowed chairs and to recruit faculty and top graduate students, according to UCI.
The business school expects to put up a banner with the new name on Tuesday with a permanent sign to follow, Policano said.
The move is a coup for UCI, which has long sought a name sponsor for its business school. The gift also sets a record for the school.
UCI’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.
Last year, Donald Bren, chairman of The Irvine Company, gave $20 million and had UCI’s School of Information and Computer Sciences named after him.
Policano, a prolific fund-raiser while dean of the University of Wisconsin at Madison’s business school, is credited with sealing the deal with Merage.
Merage had a hand in recruiting Policano, who started at UCI last year. Policano said he first met Merage in early 2004 while visiting UCI. He met with him again in March, Policano said.
Plans for the donation were finished in December, according to Policano.
But talks with Merage predate Policano.
Chancellor Ralph Cicerone, who’s leaving at the end of June to become president of the National Academies of Science in Washington, D.C., played a big part, Policano said.
So did Jone Pearce, a business school professor who served as interim dean before Policano, and Thomas J. Mitchell, UCI’s chief fund-raiser, he said.
The Merage gift is part of Policano’s $100 million fund-raising effort for the business school.
