The Silicon Valley Classic was a tennis tournament on the WTA Tour held on the campus of San Jose State University in San Jose, California. Started in 1971, the tournament was the oldest women's-only tournament in the world and was played on outdoor hardcourts.[1] It was the first women's tournament in the annual US Open Series.
The tournament started out as the British Motor Cars Invitation in 1971 on the Virginia Slims circuit. Prior to 1978, the tournament was known as the Virginia Slims of San Francisco. The tournament was sponsored by Bank of the West from 1992 to 2017 (branding it as the Bank of the West Classic), and held on the campus of Stanford University from 1997 to 2017, and run by Dick Gould.[2]The event moved to San Jose State University in 2018 and received a new sponsor, Mubadala Investment Company, branding the tournament as the Mubadala Silicon Valley Classic.[3]
Martina Navratilova won the tournament a record five times (1979–1980, 1988, 1991, and 1993).[4]
On June 1, 2023, it was announced that the tournament would merge with the pre-existing Washington Open and move permanently to Washington, D.C. The Washington tournament thereby went from being a WTA 250 event to being a WTA 500 event. The Silicon Valley Classic thus held its final tournament in 2022.[5]