Mannerisms

Shima was working for the Japanese calculator company, Busicom, when he designed the logic for the 4004.

After the 4004 was completed, in 1971, Shima left Busicom to join Ricoh. But he was not there for long.

In November 1971, by now convinced of the market potential of the microprocessor, Intel had decided to develop an improved version of its first 8-bit microprocessor - the 8008 - which was to be called the 8080.

"One day a phone call came from Bob Noyce to Ricoh's directors", recalls Shima, "Noyce asked them: 'Please send Shima to Intel to develop the 8080'. I talked to Ricoh's directors and they said: 'You can go to Intel, but if you want to come back to Japan and work for Ricoh the time limit is four years.' I said Thank you very much.'"

"They were very good management people at Ricoh", adds Shima, "Bob Noyce's reputation in Japan was very high - everyone liked Bob Noyce. It was an honour to get such a telephone call from him. It was very nice to join Intel if Bob Noyce asked for you."

ON FRIDAY THIS WEEK, July 11^th, We begin a weekly series on how the microprocessor was born told by its inventor, Dr Ted Hoff, its maker, Dr Federico Faggin, and its designer Dr Masatoshi Shima.