The conference was held during August 7–9, 2003, at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, California. The theme of the conference was “Celebration of 100 Years of Korean Immigration to the U.S.” The proceedings of UKC 2003 were published in January 2004 in CD format, edited by Dr. Tae Wan Ryu.

About 450 professional engineers and scientists attended the conference, including over 100 participants from Korea. Professor Rudy Marcus, a Nobel laureate, delivered a plenary talk. Local staff members from the Southern California Chapter contributed to the success of the conference.