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in the beginning -Leadwire, Volume 9, Number 10, October 1967 Fairchild Semiconductor waded into the semiconductor business ten years ago. The official date was October 16, 1957, though a research effort had been launched long before that by eight scientists
and engineers working in a Palo Alto garage attached to Vick Grinich's
house. Their discovery of the Planar process would permit economic
volume manufacturing of transistors, diodes, and microcircuits of
unequaled reliability. But that's jumping ahead of the story.
First they needed financial backing, and Fairchild Camera and Instrument was willing to make the investment. Backed by FCI, they moved into larger facilities at 844 Charleston Road (until just recently it has served as one of Instrumentation's locations). Though a fledgling operation, the company got its first big boost in January 1958 when IBM placed the first order for silicon transistors-100 of them. Production hasn't stopped since, and of course, today, Fairchild Semiconductor is one of the world's largest suppliers of silicon semiconductor devices. Today, four of those first eight men are still hard at work for Fairchild. The initial group included Dr. Robert Noyce, group vice president of FCI; Dr. Vic Grinich, general manager of Instrumentation; Dr. Gordon Moore, director of Research and Development; Julie Blank, facilities manager. Additionally, their first employee, a technician named Murray Siegel, is now head of Industrial Applications. Today, the Semiconductor division numbers more than 13,000 people located in Hong Kong, Australia, the Republic of Korea, Mexico, Canada, Europe and the United States . . . a reality that has far surpassed the wildest imaginations of eight young men working in a converted garage. |
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