Chip War: The Fight for the World's Most Critical Technology

by Chris Miller

Bob Noyce knew that military and space programs were crucial for Fairchild’s early success, admitting in 1965 that military and space applications would use “over 95% of the circuits produced this year.” But he always envisioned an even larger civilian market for his chips, though in the early 1960s no such market existed. He would have to create it, which meant keeping the military at arm’s length so that he—not the Pentagon—set Fairchild’s R&D priorities. Noyce declined most military research contracts, estimating that Fairchild never relied on the Defense Department for more than 4 percent of its R&D budget. “There are very few research directors anywhere in the world who are really adequate to the job” of assessing Fairchild’s work, Noyce explained confidently, “and they are not often career officers in the Army.”