18 July 2008

On this day in history: Intel founded, 1968

In the late '60s, the chemist and physicist, Dr. Gordon E. Moore, and the co-inventor of the integrated circuit, Robert N. Noyce departed Fairchild Semiconductor to set up their own company: initially NM Electronics but soon renamed Integrated Electronics Corporation, or Intel for short. Since Intelco was already used as a trademark by an hotel chain, Moore and Noyce had to buy the rights to the name in order to trade as Intel.

With money raised by the venture capitalist Arthur Rock, who became Intel's first chairman, Moore and Noyce founded their new company on 18th July 1968, based in Santa Clara, California, which was at the centre of the are soon to be known as Silicon Valley. At the outset, Intel focused on the production of semiconductors, particularly Static Random Access Memory chips for use in computers.

Dr. Gordon E. Moore and Robert N. Noyce in 1974


When the personal computing boom started, Intel were well placed to make the most of it, inventing the x86 line of computer processors, which IBM used in their PCs. Today Intel are the major manufacturer of semiconductors in the world producing a range of computing devices.

The corporate history of the company is available on their Intel Museum Worldwide site.

4 comments:

  1. You know, it's still amazing to me that this really wasn't that long ago. The pace of life has accelerated so much due to companies like Intel and their inventions. And it's all in my lifetime.

    Truly - this blows me away!

    Thanks for the blog post - great reading.

    Warmly,

    ~Laura

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  2. Good to know Intel's history. In Penang, they are the highest paying Employer. One of my friend is a software engineer earning $7000+ a month. I wonder what would be the managers salary.

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  3. Laura: for some (older?) people it doesn't seem that long ago, but some younger folk may be surprised to find out that Intel was founded in the late-60s...

    Atniz: my pleasure to share... I hope your friend shares the wealth..

    Thank you both for your comments
    K

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  4. I'm one of the older folk lol, it really isn't that long ago...I hope!

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