This was the moment of clarity. From the perspective of an outsider, someone not encumbered by the historical legacy and the political infighting, shutting down the memory business was the obvious thing to do. The switch in perspectives—“What would our successors do?”—helped Moore and Grove see the big picture clearly. Of course, abandoning memory was not easy. Many of Grove’s colleagues were furiously opposed to the idea. Some held that memory was the seedbed of Intel’s technology expertise and that without it, other areas of research were likely to wither.
