"...the power is the frequency, proportional to the capacitance, which is one over the scaling factor squared in capacitance per unit area times the area times V squared." -- Gordon Moore

Born: 1929
Died: -
Industry: Computer Electronics

Estimated wealth (today's dollars): 15 Billion

Brief Biography:

When he was 10 or 11 years old, Gordon Moore found an interest in chemistry. His next door neighbor got a chemistry set for Christmas, and they played together, making explosives and a variety of things.

His interest in chemestry took him to a Ph.D. in chemistry, where he did missle development work at the applied physics laboratory at Johns Hopkins University. He felt the work was not that practical so when invited by Bill Shockley at Bell Labs to work on developing the silicon transistor, he took the job.

After some years at Bell, Gordon Moore quit and started up Intel, with the idea of producing some new ideas that was not being followed on the markets, and with some financing from a Japanese firm which wanted to make calculators, in 1971 they invented the first microprocessor, launching Intel as the leader in the computer revolution.

Gordon E. Moore is currently Chairman Emeritus of Intel Corporation. Moore co-founded Intel in 1968, serving initially as Executive Vice President. He became President and Chief Executive Officer in 1975 and held that post until elected chairman and Chief Executive Officer in 1979. He remained CEO until 1987 and was named Chairman Emeritus in 1997. Moore is widely known for "Moore's Law," in which he predicted that the number of transistors that the industry would be able to place on a computer chip would double every year. In 1995, he updated his prediction to once every two years. While originally intended as a rule of thumb in 1965, it has become the guiding principle for the industry to deliver ever-more-powerful semiconductor chips at proportionate decreases in cost.

After retirement, Gordon Moore took on a much larger project than discovering and developing the entire computer revolution... he now works to preserve the ecology of the planet, Biodiversity.

Accomplishments:

Books by and/or about:

• Applied Materials : Pioneering the Information Age
• Prelude to Battle (out of print)

Websites:

• An interview with Gordon Moore
• Silicon Genesis: Oral Histories of Semiconductor Industry Pioneers Transcribed oral history
• Gordon Moore's Incredible Journey Origionally from Fortune Magazine