THE GROWTH OF INTEL

The Growth of Intel and the Learning Curve

The Growth of Intel and the Learning Curve

Introduction

Intel Corporation is an American multinational semi conductor chip maker corporation which is headquarters in California and based on its revenue, is the world's highest and largest valued semi conductor chip maker. Most of the micro processors in most personal computers today are found of Intel. It was founded in 1968 and among its production includes motherboard chip sets, flash memory, network interface controllers, graphic chips, integrated circuits, embedded processors and many other devices which are related to computing and communications. The company was founded by Gordon Moore who is also the founder of Moore's law which will be later be discussed in this paper, as it includes the main theme of the paper, and Robert Noyce who was the founder of semi conductors, and also Andrew Grove whose vision and executive leadership is widely associated. Intel was also an early designer of DRAM and SRAM memory chips which until 1981 represented the major part of its business. And although, the world's first microprocessor was created by the Intel in 1971, it didn't become its primary business until the success of personal computers. The company's brands value was ranked at 58 by the world's 100 most valuable brands ranking of 2011.

Discussion

Between 1971 and 1990 American manufacturing companies return on sales averaged 4.7 percent (McGahan, 1993). Intel's average return on sale roughly over this time period has been reported three times these manufacturing companies. In 1998 it received over 6 billion net income and in the previous year in 1997 nearly 7 billion and coming after the Royal Dutch Shell, General Electronics and Exxon and within existence of three decades it had reached 25 billion in sales and stood at the top 5 in the country among its market capitalization.

As mentioned earlier, Intel's primary product included DRAM and SRAM which is a type of computer memory. Like many other electronic devices, these are also integrated circuits which are used in a host of applications from aerospace, to automobiles, to consumer electronics. These IC's further consists of die which are bonded into ceramic or plastic packages. Transistors is the major device used in these integrated circuits and it acts like an off and on switch and can also be arranged to perform a variety of functions (Gullickson, n.d.). Transistors are basically the key around which the entire industry of microelectronics is built. Since its initial start, the industry of microelectronics had grown with a tremendous speed, being labeled the most important invention of the 20th century because of the fact that the transistors are the basic building blocks for many integrated circuits and most importantly the micro processors. Over more than 20 years ago the founders of Intel Moore and Noyce had predicted a growth of the electronics industry to an exponential level and they believed that the revolution of micro electronics is very far from having running its course as there ...