American inventor Ray Dolby, the audio pioneer and founder of Dolby Laboratories, has died at 80.

The company said he died in his home at San Francisco. He had Alzheimer’s disease for several years and was diagnosed with acute leukaemia in the summer.

Dolby founded his namesake company in 1965 and grew it into an industry leader of audio technology. His work in noise reduction and surround sound led to the creation of a number of technologies that are still used in music, movies and entertainment today.

“Today we lost a friend, mentor and true visionary,” Kevin Yeaman, president and chief executive of Dolby Laboratories, said.

Yeaman said Dolby invented an entire industry around delivering an experience in sound. His work ranged from helping to reduce the hiss in cassette recordings to bringing Star Wars to life on the big screen in Dolby Stereo.

Dolby held 50 US patents and won a number of notable awards for his life’s work, including several Emmys, two Oscars and a Grammy.

He was awarded the National Medal of Technology from President Bill Clinton and was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in the US and the Royal Academy of Engineers in the UK, among other honours. Last year the theatre that serves as home to the Academy Awards was renamed the Dolby Theatre and the Ray Dolby Ballroom was named in his honour.

“Ray really managed to have a dream job,” said Dagmar Dolby, his wife of 47 years. “Because he could do exactly what he wanted to do, whichever way he wanted to do it, and in the process, did a lot of good for many music and film lovers. And in the end, built a very successful company.”

Dolby was born in Portland, Oregon, and his family eventually moved to the San Francisco peninsula. It was there that he started his work at Ampex Corporation, working on videotape recording systems while he was still a student.

After graduating from Stanford University, he left Ampex to study at Cambridge University. Following his time as a United Nations adviser in India, he returned to England and founded Dolby in London. In 1976, he moved to San Francisco where the company established its headquarters.

Dolby’s co-workers described him as an inspiring and thoughtful man, who cared passionately about engineering.

“To be an inventor, you have to be willing to live with a sense of uncertainty, to work in the darkness and grope toward an answer, to put up with the anxiety about whether there is an answer,” he once said.

He is survived by his wife, sons Tom and David, and four grandchildren. Dolby and his wife were active in philanthropy and supported numerous organisations. The Ray and Dagmar Dolby Regeneration Medicine Building at the University of California, San Francisco’s Stem Cell Centre and the Brain Health Centre at California Pacific Medical Centre were opened with their support.

His family described Dolby as generous, patient, curious and fair.

“Though he was an engineer at heart, my father’s achievements in technology grew out of a love of music and the arts,” said Tom Dolby, a film-maker and novelist.

American genius

Ray Dolby was born in Portland, Oregon in January 1933, and his family eventually moved to the San Francisco Peninsula. From 1949 to 1957, he worked on various audio and instrumentation projects at Ampex Corporation where he led the development of the electronic aspects of the Ampex videotape recording system.

In 1957, he received a BS degree in electrical engineering from Stanford University. Upon being awarded a Marshall Scholarship and a National Science Foundation graduate fellowship, Dolby left Ampex for further study at Cambridge University in England.

In 1960, he became the first American to be named a Fellow at Pembroke College. Dolby received a PhD degree in physics from Cambridge in 1961 and years later was elected an Honorary Fellow (1983). While at Cambridge he met his wife, Dagmar, who was there as a summer student in 1962. During his last year at Cambridge, Dolby also served as a consultant to the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority.

In 1963, Dolby took up a two-year appointment as a United Nations adviser in India, and then returned to England in 1965 and founded Dolby Laboratories in London. In 1976, he moved to San Francisco where the company established its headquarters, laboratories, and manufacturing facilities.