Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
search and academic institutes. The high cost of computer rent-
als, maintenance, and operation was passed on to customers
and that significantly limited the use of computers by small and
medium-sized companies.
Kutt foresaw a very different future for computing than did
the major computer manufacturers. A practical, inexpensive,
and easy-to-operate personal computer, in his view, would make
computing on demand the bread and butter of many human ac-
tivities in areas such as business, finance, and education as well
as research, engineering, data entry, and processing. In the not
so distant future, he speculated, there would be only a limited
number of large computers in use but millions of small
PC
s in
the hands of individuals, much like glorified pocket calculators.
Kutt was convinced that this dramatic reshaping of the com-
puter scene would be brought about by the microprocessor, a
revolutionary new device that Intel Corporation of Santa Clara,
California, was about to introduce into the market. In Novem-
ber 1970, Kutt met Robert Noyce - co-founder and first
CEO
of Intel - during the Fall Joint Computer Conference in Hous-
ton, Texas. Both Intel and Consolidated Computer Incorpor-
ated (
CCI
), which Kutt had incorporated in 1969, were just two
young start-up companies, blazing trails in the computer and
semiconductor markets. In the clichéd scene of a conference re-
cess in a cocktail bar, Noyce and Kutt were passionately sharing
ideas, using napkins to draw specifications of a new gadget - an
8-bit microprocessor - that Intel was developing for Computer
Terminal Corporation and that Kutt wanted for novel data
entry products developed by
CCI
. But even though
CCI
was
rapidly gaining an international reputation, Kutt never saw the
introduction of microprocessor technology into
CCI
products.
A few months after his meeting with Noyce, he was forced out
of
CCI
in rather murky circumstances.
It was through the application of microprocessor technology
that Kutt hoped to achieve the hardware objectives of his new,
