Fable

There was once a founder and CEO of an EDA company who was found to have falsified entries in his engineering notebook during a patent case which he lost. He was charged with obstruction of justice, intimidation of witnesses, perjury and solicitation of arson. While in jail he was further indicted for trying to have the judge in the patent ...

There was once a German (pictured) who became fed up with his life in Munich and thought he would try England. After a very short time he decided he very much liked life in England and Anglicised his name. After working in various companies he decided to set up his own and as he was  intrigued by electrical appliances he ...

141 years ago this man  founded an electronics company which lasted for over 100 years: It led the world in many fields including AC transmission equipment, computing, radar and semiconductors. When its creativity ran out under later leadership, it faltered and was eventually ruined by foolishness. Moral:  Glory days come to an end

There was once a child who was sent out to work after only a single year of elementary school for his education. He was apprenticed to a metal working business at the age of nine. When 19 he patented the invention of a belt buckle which used metal teeth to grip the leather instead of holes. On the success of ...

18 years ago things weren’t looking good for private equity as David Rubenstein co-founder of Carlyle Group which had a former UK PM on its board, told the 2008 Davos World Economic Forum. The  private equity industry had passed through its golden age and was then in its ‘purgatory age’, said Rubinstein. It is not known what the former PM ...

A famous computer (pictured) used about 2,800 ICs, mostly dual three-input NOR gates and smaller numbers of expanders and sense amplifiers. The ICs, from Fairchild Semiconductor, were implemented using RTL in a flat-pack. They were connected via wire wrap, and the wiring was then embedded in epoxy plastic. The computer had 2,048 words of erasable magnetic-core memory and 36,864 words ...

In 1933 this engineer bought a used piano and chucked out everything except the keyboard action. Using the keyboard as a controller, he experimented with different sound-generating methods, finally settling on the tonewheel generator. The  device was patented in 1934, put into production, and launched onto the market in 1935, since when two million  have been sold. Moral: Adaptation can ...

One of the main scientists behind the creation of ENIAC was also the major figure behind the creation of the world’s most famous forum for presenting new ICs. At the first meeting of the forum, in 1954, six papers were presented from Bell, GE, MIT, Philco, RCA and Pennsylvania University. 601 people attended with foreign attendees came from the UK, ...

There was once a genius engineer who designed a computer. He took it to his bosses in the large company which he worked for and suggested that they manufacture it The bosses pointed out: 1. The engineer did not have a college degree 2.  The engineer had no formal qualifications for computer design. The engineer became an entrepreneur and four ...

This was a fabled recruitment ad for a chip company founded by a master showman and in the top ten to this day: Moral: One Day Your Wave  Will Come