Sir Charles Kuen Kao was a Hong Kong electrical engineer and physicist who pioneered the development and use of fibre optics in telecommunications. In the 1960s, Kao created various methods to combine glass fibres with lasers in order to transmit digital data, which laid the groundwork for the evolution of the Internet. "Communication as we know it, including the Internet, would not exist without fiber optics", said William Wulf, president of the National Academy of Engineering in 1999.Known as the "Godfather of Broadband", the "Father of Fibre Optics", and the "Father of Fiber Optic Communications", Kao was awarded the 2009 Nobel Prize in Physics for "groundbreaking achievements concerning the transmission of light in fibers for optical communication".Born in Shanghai, China, Kao was a permanent resident of Hong Kong and held citizenships in the United Kingdom and the United States. His international travels led him to opine that he belonged to the world instead of any country. An open letter published by Kao and his wife in 2010 later clarified that "Charles studied in Hong Kong for his high schooling, he has taught here, he was the Vice-Chancellor of CUHK and retired here too. So he is a Hong Kong belonger."
In an interview, April 9, 1995, about his efforts at persuading telecommunications companies to use optical fibers, as quoted by [Jeff Hecht, City of light: the story of fiber optics, Oxford University Press, 2004, 0195162552, 117]
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