I ran across an old magazine a few days ago and it brought back a lot of memories. The magazine contains an article entitled “The Chip Man Finally Comes” discussing the founding of Integrated Device Technology’s (IDT) Atlanta Design Center (ADC). This was IDT’s first design group outside of California. ADC was different not only in location but in concept. it was a central design organization and worked with all of the product lines in the company. For 16 years I ran ADC and it was the most fun I have ever had in my career. From just an idea it grew and generated hundreds of millions of dollars of revenue in many areas including networking, memory, logic, clocking and power. It’s a great feeling to create something like that and I feel fortunate to have had the experience. To take a small group of engineers and beat the competition when they have more money and more people is an awesome feeling. Looking at the operation today it’s easy to forget the early days of $10 surplus desks and a few people in a single room. For those interested, and particularly those who experience ADC, I have posted the article here.