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Cramming More Components onto Integrated Circuits

Cramming More Components onto Integrated Circuits

Image creditIntel Free Press
CC BY-SA 2.0

Cramming More Components onto Integrated Circuits

Year
1965
Creator
Gordon Moore
Company
Fairchild Semiconductor; published in Electronics magazine
Location

Description

Gordon Moore of Fairchild wrote this article for the April 19, 1965 issue of Electronics magazine, whose cover is shown. In it, he plotted the number of components on the most economical chip and projected the curve 10 years ahead.

Importance

Moore forecast that the count would double each year and reach 65,000 components per chip by 1975. In 1975, Moore, then at Intel, changed his estimate to a doubling every two years. After Carver Mead named it Moore's Law, the chip industry used the forecast as a target for its technical progress.

Interesting fact

Moore based his 10-year forecast on only five data points, from chips made between 1959 and 1964.

Sources

  1. 1965: Moore's Law Predicts the Future of Integrated CircuitsComputer History Museum, The Silicon Engine
  2. Milestones: Moore's Law, 1965IEEE, Engineering and Technology History Wiki · 2018-08-15