Nowadays, as Gates rolls out his ever-expanding ideas for Dorchester, he's also ping-ponging to museum shows, art fairs and collector dinners the world over as befits an emerging artist on the cusp of superstardom.

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In 1985, along with business partner Roy Chung Chi-ping, he founded Techtronic Industries in Hong Kong, which had six employees and focused on producing rechargeable battery packs in hand tools.

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Stackhouse also likes the TopSpin concept because he is an avid ping-pong player.

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The common area boasts a ping-pong table, he said.

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"You don't have to be a ping-pong player to like it, " he says.

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Mr. Weitzman says his lifelong love of ping-pong was rekindled about six years ago when he was visiting a friend.

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And they knew he had a ping there, and so they were ready, when he landed in Detroit, to question him about that -- that ping against the TIDE database.

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