0195163435, Pages: 440
Hailed as the Thomas Edison and Henry Ford of Silicon Valley, Robert Noyce was a brilliant inventor, a
leading entrepreneur, and a daring risk taker who piloted his own jets and skied mountains accessible
only by helicopter. Now, in The Man Behind the Microchip, Leslie Berlin captures not only this colorful
individual but also the vibrant interplay of technology, business, money, politics, and culture that
defines Silicon Valley. Here is the life of a giant of the high-tech industry, the co-founder of
Fairchild Semiconductor and Intel who co-invented the integrated circuit, the electronic heart of every
modern computer, automobile, cellular telephone, advanced weapon, and video game. With access to
never-before-seen documents, Berlin paints a fascinating portrait of Noyce: he was an ambitious and
intensely competitive multimillionaire who exuded a "just folks" sort of charm, a Midwestern preacher's
son who rejected organized religion but would counsel his employees to "go off and do something
wonderful," a man who never looked back and sometimes paid a price for it. In addition, this vivid
narrative sheds light on Noyce's friends and associates, including some of the best-known managers,
venture capitalists, and creative minds in Silicon Valley. Berlin draws upon interviews with dozens of
key players in modern American business--including Andy Grove, Steve Jobs, Gordon Moore, and Warren
Buffett; their recollections of Noyce give readers a privileged, first-hand look inside the dynamic
world of high-tech entrepreneurship. A modern American success story, The Man Behind the Microchip
illuminates the triumphs and setbacks of one of the most important inventors and entrepreneurs of our
time.
The Washington Post
The book is at its best when connecting Noyce's adventure with the industry and culture booming around
him. The success went to his head, and he was soon chain-smoking and brashly cheating on his wife.
Despite his "disdain for hierarchy," as Berlin calls it, Noyce floated readily to the top, far from the
distant front lines of engineering that he once swore by. Though slow going at times, Berlin's
thoughtful and thorough biography is at once a celebratory and a cautionary tale.
Publishers Weekly
By the high-tech boom of the 1990s, Intel CEO Andy Grove had become the man most commonly associated
with the industry's leading manufacturer of microprocessors. But the real credit for creating Intel,
Berlin argues, belongs to Noyce (1927-1990), who cofounded the company with Gordon Moore in 1968-a
little more than a decade after the two men took part in the creation of another early Silicon Valley
fixture, Fairchild Semiconductor. Berlin, a science historian at Stanford, provides a well-rounded
biography that easily establishes Noyce's scientific credentials-in addition to holding the patent on
the integrated circuit, he also just missed out on taking credit for two Nobel-worthy discoveries-as
well as his bumpy path through the corporate world, which began when he was recruited by seven
colleagues to break away from the research lab where they were employed to found Fairchild. Interviews
with Noyce's contemporaries and family illuminate the less happy aspects of his personal life. With the
bloom off the Internet economy, it may prove harder to generate interest in the life of a technology
executive, but that shouldn't diminish Berlin's excellent work here. (June) Copyright 2005 Reed
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