Gordon Moore, a semiconductor industry pioneer whose “Moore’s Law” predicted a steady rise in computing power for decades is dead.
He died surrounded by family at his home in Hawaii on Friday at the age of 94, Intel said.
Moore was the rolled-up-sleeves engineer in a triumvirate of technology luminaries who eventually put “Intel Inside” processors in more than 80% of the world’s personal computers, co-founding Intel in 1968.
He went to work at the Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory where he met future Intel cofounder Robert Noyce. Part of the “traitorous eight,” they departed in 1957 to launch Fairchild Semiconductor.
In 1968, Moore and Noyce left Fairchild to start the memory chip company that would soon be named Intel, an abbreviation of Integrated Electronics. Moore and Noyce’s first hire was another Fairchild colleague, Andy Grove, who would lead Intel through much of its explosive growth in the 1980s and 1990s.
‘Silicon Valley’s founding father’
Over his lifetime, Moore donated more than $5.1 billion to charitable causes through the foundation he set up with his wife of 72 years, Betty.
“Though he never aspired to be a household name, Gordon’s vision and his life’s work enabled the phenomenal innovation and technological developments that shape our everyday lives,” said Harvey Fineberg, president of the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation.
Leaders of Intel heaped tribute on Moore.
“He was instrumental in revealing the power of transistors, and inspired technologists and entrepreneurs across the decades,” said Intel chief executive Pat Gelsinger.
“He leaves behind a legacy that changed the lives of every person on the planet. His memory will live on,” Gelsinger added on Twitter.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai said in a tweet that Moore’s vision “inspired so many of us to pursue technology,” while Apple CEO Tim Cook called him “one of Silicon Valley’s founding fathers.”
“All of us who followed owe him a debt of gratitude,” Cook said on Twitter. “May he rest in peace.”
