BIO
Mr. Frank Liu was born into a military family in Hong Kong in 1948. After Chiang Kai-shek's retreat to Taiwan, Mr. Frank recalls moving to Taiwan in his childhood due to his father’s involvement in the government as a military general. Following graduation from high school in Taiwan, Mr. Liu’s performance in the university entrance exam gave him a chance to study Biomedical Engineering in National Taiwan University. His father’s philanthropic action of donating land for a charitable library served as an inspiration for Mr. Liu’s later philanthropic acts. After completing his military service, he immigrated to the U.S. with his wife and settled in Minnesota where he pursued his PhD in Fluid Mechanics at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis. During his two years at the university, he worked at different jobs as a teaching assistant and research assistant. After graduating, he moved to Houston to work at the research center for Shell oil company. During his thirty year career at Shell, he has served as an Engineer, Energy Coordinator, Executive Vice President at the Beijing office, and Shell’s Manager of remote monitoring technology in Malaysia. He has two sons, one of whom is a professor and the other a businessman. He has retired and is currently living in Houston. In this interview, Mr. Liu talks about her upbringing in a military household, specifically his father’s impact in instilling the values of philanthropy and independence. He discusses his career in engineering from researching as a PhD student at University of Minnesota to working for major oil companies like Shell for over thirty years. He passionately talks about his inventions like “goldfinger” that successfully addressed the issue of overheating of furnaces in oil refineries and his projects to expand Shell’s reach in Asian countries like China and India. Mr. Liu also touches upon subjects such as health, cultural shocks, his charitable works at a local church, and his executive role in companies in the US and global oil industry.