Mannerisms

Nowhere in Intel's corporate histories do you read anything about Bob Graham, but he is frequently referred to in contemporary accounts as one of the founders of Intel.

He was the first marketing guy at the company, moving over from Fairchild with Bob Noyce, Gordon Moore and Andy Grove to set up Intel.

In May 1971 Grove had gone to Moore and told him he might leave Intel. According to Leslie Berlin, author of The Man Behind The Microchip, Grove later said: "It was far too painful for me to continue to do what I needed to do at work and fight Bob Graham."

Moore went to Noyce who set about finding a replacement and recruited Ed Gelbach.

When Moore, who was a personal friend of Graham's, went on holiday in July 1971, Noyce went to Graham's office and, according to Berlin, said: "Shit. We have an incompatible situation here and you're going to have to go."

Graham left Intel and, apparently, all trace of his presence in the Intel Empire was expunged.

Grove had his likes and dislikes. He tells Charlie Sporck, CEO of National Semiconductor, how he left Fairchild, as quoted in Sporck's book SPINOFF

The conversdation between Moore and Grove at a technical conference in Colorado went like this:

Gordon Moore: "I've decided to leave Fairchild"

Grove: "I want to go with you

Later on in the same conversation

Moore: "By the way, Bob Noyce is involved with this"

Grove: "I said 'Oh.' I was not happy about that. My first reaction to hearing that was 'Oh, shit'."

Asked by Sporck why his reaction to Noyce was so negative, Grove told him:

"I found Bob aloof, indecisive - watching staff meetings where people were devouring each other - and Bob would look detached."

Noyce might be about to undergo the same airbrushing treatment as Bob Graham. On the Intel web-site there are photos of Gordon Moore and Bob Noyce but, whereas Moore is described as 'co-founder', there is no description of  Noyce's position.

Besides putting up $250,000 of Intel's initial $2 million seed capital, writing its first business plan, and acting as its founding CEO, what more do you have to do to get named in the company's history as a founder?