Microchip Pioneer Jack Kilby Dies (You Wouldn't Be Reading This Had It Not Been For Kilby)

BBC News ^ | June 22, 2005 | BBC News

[MisterRepublican]

Jack Kilby, the US inventor of the integrated circuit which formed the basis of the computer chip, has died aged 81, after a battle with cancer.

The discovery that transistors could be shrunk on to a single block of silicon paved the way for personal computers, mobile phones and microwave ovens.

Experts rank his contribution to invention alongside those of Henry Ford and Thomas Edison.

It spawned a multi-billion dollar industry and earned him a Nobel Prize.

Jack Kilby grew up in Kansas and fulfilled his ambition to become an engineer at the University of Illinois.

He joined Texas Instruments soon after and made his discovery working alone in the laboratory while his colleagues enjoyed a summer vacation.

[TheBigB]

Good thing for him that Al Gore invented the internet several years later!

[Piquaboy]

You beat me to it.

[MissEdie]

R.I.P. to a true genius!

[blam]

I met this man once in passing. I retired from Texas Instruments at the end of 1994.

[MisterRepublican]

I have always been intrigued by Kilby. He invented (though some would argue Noyce did) the IC chip which made possible some of the greatest advancements in technology. And yet this man, who should be as famous as Edison or Bell or Gates, is not well known to most Americans.

[Izzy Dunne]

(You Wouldn't Be Reading This Had It Not Been For Kilby)

I disagree.
No denigration to Kilby intended, but the I.C. would have been invented by someone.

[Constitution Day]

RIP.
He was one of the truly great minds of the 20th century.

Texas Instruments website:
The Chip that Jack Built Changed the World

[skeeter]

Kilby may deserve the credit, but Noyce gets tagged as the inventor of the IC because he was a more charismatic guy, his association with Shockley & the Fairchild 'Traitorous Eight'. Silicon Valley lore, etc.

[AlexW]

It is my opinion that the transistor, the basic building block of integrated circuits, was the most significant invention of the 20th century.
Stop to think of what we have as a result.
If it were not for the transistor, we would not have as much as a touch-tone telephone, much less, communications satellites, home computers, internet, on and on.
Twenty five years ago, mobile phones as we know them today, were not even a science fiction concept.

Large scale integrated circuits will continue to have a profound effect on the way we live.

[Publius6961]

You're lucky to have been a part of history. Most people don't have a clue as to the true measure of contributions like this man's.

I really enjoy obscure, dry but ultimately fascinating history. Although I lived through most of it I remain ignorant of most of the landmark discoveries and inventions that literally changed history.

A good example of what's available for nuts like me is a most satisfying book I found right here at FR: A History of Modern Computing, by Paul E. Ceruzzi, The MIT Press, 1998, 2003.

There he is, Jack Kilby, pp 179, 182-185.

"Out side of a dog, books are man's best friend; inside of a dog, it's too dark to read"--- Mark Twain.

[whd23]

Twenty five years ago, mobile phones as we know them today, were not even a science fiction concept.

[AlexW]

"but the I.C. would have been invented by someone"

You remind me of some guy that, around 1900, that said
that anything worthwhile had been invented, and there were no more great inventions to come.

You did not say the same thing, but really....

Yes something will be invented someday by someone....duhhh

[AlexW]

Hahaha...I just knew someone would bring up Dick Tracey.
I was thinking about his wrist radio just a few days ago,
but his watch was just a simple two-way radio.
It was nothing that came close to mobiles of today.
Did it have games, internet, camera, calculator ?

Well, I am still waiting for a magnetic space coupe...Now that would really be spiffy!!!

[Petronski]

Every eighteen months the amount of information on his tombstone will double.

[JCEccles]

No denigration to Kilby intended, but the I.C. would have been invented by someone.

Very true. Robert Noyce at Fairchild Semiconductor developed the same idea independently at almost exactly the same time.

[wsack]

Actually, there is a difference between someone who invents something "out of the blue" and an invention which is a natuaral extension of work being currently done. The IC circuit was a natural extension out of basic transistor development. Kilby merely won the race on who would do it first. Similar to Alexander Graham Bell, who's credited with inventing the telephone, but only because he beat his rival to the patent office by a number of hours.

[dljordan]

Damn! I thought the chip was invented in Bangalore or maybe Beijing. This can't be right.

[RATkiller]

But these American engineers; we don't need them anymore. We have the Indians and Chinese to think for us. All we have to do is design logos, sell greeting cards to each other, and empty bed pans.

[JCEccles]

If it's truly a natural extension of work currently being done, it may be "anticipated by prior art" and therefore not patentable.

In this case the idea "pack components close together in single, dense common space" was likely on many, many minds, a natural extension of work being done. Kilby's out-of-the-blue contribution was his epiphany that this could be done efficiently on a silicon substrate.