The chip-maker Intel was founded
On this day · 18 July 1968
In 1968, two Fairchild defectors started a company whose chips would power the personal computer age.
On July 18, 1968, Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore incorporated a new semiconductor company in Mountain View, California. The two had been founding members of Fairchild Semiconductor, where Noyce co-invented the integrated circuit and Moore articulated the famous law that bears his name.
They first registered the venture as NM Electronics, but within weeks renamed it Intel, short for Integrated Electronics. The pair each put in $250,000, with another $2.5 million raised from investors.
Two Silicon Valley legends walked out of Fairchild and built the company that would define the chip.
Intel began making memory chips, then in 1971 shipped the Intel 4004, the first commercially available microprocessor. That single product helped ignite the personal computer revolution, and Intel’s chips would dominate the industry for decades, turning a small Mountain View startup into one of the most influential firms in technology.
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