A speaker whose story is potentially inspiring to entrepreneurs, economic developers and students of business will tell a Blacksburg audience next week how he created a multimillion-dollar semiconductor company outside a major city.

Business people in Southwest Virginia may be able to relate because Jerry Neal, founder of RF Micro Devices in Greensboro, N.C., is building a company far from the mainstream providers of capital and importing at least some of the necessary talent for success, said Cory Donovan, who directs the NewVa Corridor Technology Council.

Neal is scheduled to give the keynote address at the council's annual fall gala Thursday at The Inn at Virginia Tech. A reception will begin at 5:30 p.m., with dinner and a program starting at 7.

Organizers had sold slightly more than 200 tickets as of early Thursday afternoon. Tickets are still on sale at thetechnologycouncil.com/gala.

Donovan said Dan Wrappe made the introduction to Neal. Wrappe runs Wireless MedCare, a health care technology business in Roanoke. For further insights, Donovan read Neal's book, "Fire in the Belly: Building a World-leading High-tech Company from Scratch in Tumultuous Times."

It documents the company's launch in 1991 by Neal and two partners, who had just been laid off by the technology company where all three worked, through a period of success, when the stock exceeded $80 a share.

At one time, the company said, half of cellphones worldwide contained a circuit made by RF Micro, and the company's market capitalization reached $16 billion.

Today, RF Micro's fortunes are much different.

It lost $898.6 million, or $3.42 a share, on revenue of $886.5 million last year. Its latest reported quarter, the first, was profitable to the tune of $4.8 million, or 2 cents a share. Market capitalization is just over $1 billion. Shares of RF Micro Devices were trading at $4.68 Thursday, about a dollar below the 52-week high.