Introduction

The first chapter is a general overview of the semiconductor industry including the influence of Moore's law on its fast pace, and gives a glimpse of its many accomplishments in a relatively short time.

Many important milestones from the invention of the Planar Transistor and the Integrated Circuit to the first Power Bipolar transistor are reviewed. And coming to more modern times the introduction of dense PowerTrench^TM technology to discrete MOSFETs as well as the pioneering of switching architectures in voltage regulators for Pentium CPUs is illustrated.