Topic: Dailies

Breakthroughs

by
Leo Crocker Rogers

Can I count the times? Well, there must have been at least five in just a few years. Breakthroughs.

We were brash young engineers, chemists, and physicists on the brink of a new industry, the silicon electronics era exploring the new solid-state physics which brought forth the transistor and eventually the integrated circuit and the micro processors. Life was outlandishly grand. We did not know tit from tat. But we knew if we could think, we could do. Mind governs.

Projects were never mapped from start to end. They were simply started. And the big ones always needed something beyond what we had, a technological breakthrough, an invention, a denial of supposed physics, a cross- over from another technology, a winner of an idea from a non-college graduate, a redefinition of something we thought we knew. From where did the ideas come? Inspiration.

My patents flowed. New ideas came so fast that they were turned into production concepts and patents were never sought. I built one of America's first ultra high purity chemical processing plants, and I knew squat. I invented the isolated gate transistor at lunch one day. I was like others doing the very same thing. We were what every semiconductor company was at the time, wild and wooly.

There were qualities that were special to our group. At least one of us would have worked for free just to be a part of the Motorola team. There was no blaming each other except for lack of commitment. No idea was denied a hearing, except the stupid ones that made money. They succeeded against all odds. People outside our field were asked for solutions to problems we could barely define. And we expected breakthroughs. I mean we really depended upon them. We knew that without seeing things a new way, we would not succeed. So we swung at every pitch. As a physicist, I knew everything had to be just right. Breakthroughs made it so. When there was no way, a breakthrough would arrive. Glory, glory, hallelujah.

Not one of our projects failed. Not all succeeded, but none failed. So building on our small successes, the projects became larger and larger. After a while, we were somewhat selective about swinging at every pitch. At the beginning, each swing cost us $10.00, but later, a swing could cost $1,000,000.00 then tens of millions and up. Then, we selected our opportunities.

Today, everyone wants a new path detailed so clearly that from the board room on down, every detail is outlined. As so it should be, if it can be. But to bring something new to the table of a company, one has to go where no man has gone before. That can be exciting if everyone is on the positive side of the coin. It can be uncomfortable if a doubting Thomas is in the herd -- a constant contrarian and always in the name of good. Ah Jesus, must we have Thomas'?.

The longest times of those days were the weekends. We had to wait two days to get everyone in the same room to do our stuff. Mondays were explosion days. Ideas came upon us like a thunder storm. Fridays were sad days so we hung around until 7:00 p.m. just to talk. Every, and any, time any of us met, we talked shop. Shop was the glory.

Unbridled enthusiasm. America was and is built on such stuff.

"Stuff" is a real word. It is used 13 times in the King James version of the Bible.

Expect breakthrough and breakthroughs come. "Knock and it shall be opened." Matt 7:7

Remember, "Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana."

My best,

Leo