The history of the 4004

Twenty-five years ago, in November 1971, an advertisement appeared in Electronic News: “Announcing a new era in integrated electronics, a microprogrammable computer on a chip”. The ad was placed by Intel Corporation of Santa Clara, California, then just over three years old. From that modest but prophetic beginning, the microprocessor market has grown into a multibillion-dollar business, and Intel has maintained a leadership position, particularly in microprocessors for personal computers. The authors look at the design and development of the 4004