Richard Busch, of Austin, Texas, serves as founder and CEO of The Busch Group, where he provides advisory services to international technology firms of all sizes. Earlier in his career, Richard Busch built up extensive experience in semiconductor technology while working for IBM and the Austin, Texas, location of Globalfoundries.
Though many consider the semiconductor industry to be a new one, its history dates back more than 200 years. The first mention of “semiconducting” appeared in 1782, when Italian inventor and electricity pioneer Alessandro Volta coined the term; however, it was not until 1833 that anyone bore witness to the effects of semiconducting. During an experiment on silver sulfide, Michael Faraday observed that this solution conducted energy more effectively when raised to high temperatures. Ferdinand Braun would later detail the first documented effects of a semiconductor diode.
The modern semiconductor industry can trace more direct roots back to 1901, which saw the patenting of the semiconductor rectifier. This device, known as “cat whiskers,” was designed for use in recognizing radio waves. Semiconductors made another significant leap forward in 1947 and 1948, when two separate groups of inventors debuted the world’s first point-contact transistors. With the later invention of the integrated circuit, the semiconductor evolved into a commercial device in the early 1960s. Semiconductors have since developed even further thanks to products such as single-chip processors and electronic design automation, or EDA.
Though many consider the semiconductor industry to be a new one, its history dates back more than 200 years. The first mention of “semiconducting” appeared in 1782, when Italian inventor and electricity pioneer Alessandro Volta coined the term; however, it was not until 1833 that anyone bore witness to the effects of semiconducting. During an experiment on silver sulfide, Michael Faraday observed that this solution conducted energy more effectively when raised to high temperatures. Ferdinand Braun would later detail the first documented effects of a semiconductor diode.
The modern semiconductor industry can trace more direct roots back to 1901, which saw the patenting of the semiconductor rectifier. This device, known as “cat whiskers,” was designed for use in recognizing radio waves. Semiconductors made another significant leap forward in 1947 and 1948, when two separate groups of inventors debuted the world’s first point-contact transistors. With the later invention of the integrated circuit, the semiconductor evolved into a commercial device in the early 1960s. Semiconductors have since developed even further thanks to products such as single-chip processors and electronic design automation, or EDA.
