It was great to see the Google homepage today honoring Robert "Bob" Noyce
who was born Dec 12th 1927 and passed away in June 1990.
Noyce is one of those figures whom the general public would have been largely
unaware of but whose contributions helped shape the modern technological world
we live in today.
Noyce was one of the pioneers of Silicon Valley and is co-credited with the
invention in 1959 of what might be thought of as the first truly practical integrated
circuit manufacturing process which is known as the planar process.
In 1957, Noyce and seven of his colleagues became coined the "Traitorous
Eight" when they grew tired of working for William Shockley at Shockley Semiconductor
and struck out to found Fairchild Semiconductor.
The planar transistor was invented by one of Noyce's co-workers, Jean Hoenri, in
1958. By retaining an insulating layer of silicon dioxide, one could produce a highly
reliable, very thin integrated circuit which was much easier to mass produce than
the three dimensional integrated circuit device that Jack Kilby had invented
at Texas Instruments only a few months earlier. The Fairchild planar integrated
circuit process used optical masks to help "print" the circuit of multiple transistors
on a chip. It made possible the myriad of electronic devices we use today, including
the microprocessor.
In co-founding Fairchild Semiconductor, Noyce also helped set the ball in motion
for the explosive growth of Silicon Valley. Many young electrical engineers and
scientists passed through Fairchild and then struck out as entrepreneurs to found
their own companies. These companies in turned spawned others. Many of them
went on to become highly successful. These companies that were spawned
became known in the industry as the "Fair-children".
In 1968, Noyce himself left Fairchild along with colleague Gordon Moore to found
a company called Intel. The rest of course is history.
At 844 Charlestown Road in Palo Alto, there is a plaque which honors the site
as the place where the first practical integrated circuit was invented by Robert
Noyce. See
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:IC_Plaque.jpg
For an interesting 16 minute documentary on the events that caused Noyce and
his Traitorous colleagues to leave Shockley's employment and go onto change the
world, see here -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yLNh4UY5ohw
Interested readers may find this entertaining 45 minute address on the history
of the integrated circuit given by Noyce himself in May 1984 to be highly entertaining.
See
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AfxUq_QrpyY
As he mentioned at the time, in the 20 years preceding 1984, if the aircraft industry had
been able to make as much progress in price, speed and energy consumption as the
semiconductor industry had made in integrated circuit design over the same period, it
is estimated that a 767 jet liner should have only cost $500, been able to circle the
world in 20 minutes and only consume 5 gallons of gas doing so.
