Dr. Herrick received the MSEE at the University of Illinois in 1987. His career started at McDonnell Douglas, working on early OEIC and high power laser R&D, including an optical phased array. He was responsible for device modelling, epitaxial design and procurement, mask design, and process development. After gaining an interest in reliability physics from the late Dr. Robert G. Waters, Dr. Herrick went to UCSB, and did the first studies of VCSEL degradation for his Ph.D. work with Professors Larry Coldren and Pierre Petroff. In the past 27 years, Dr. Herrick has specialized in semiconductor laser reliability and failure analysis, and has written many of the most cited papers and invited book review chapters on the subject. He has worked as a laser reliability engineer for many of the large fiber-optics companies in Silicon Valley, including HP, Finisar, JDSU, and developed the component reliability program at Intel from 2013-2023. Since 2023, he has operated a growing optoelectronic reliability consultancy, primarily supporting silicon photonic startups.

He was the editor of the 2021 book “Reliability of Semiconductor Lasers and Optoelectronic Devices”, and wrote the first three chapters in it, along with 5 other highly-cited invited book chapters in reliability and failure analysis, and dozens of conference and journal papers on the subject.