Catalog ID: 330

George Smith: “When I joined in early ’79, Andy was still doing New Employee Orientation. Dennis Reker and I started the same day. Partway through he asked the 20 or so people in the class how many were in sales. Dennis and I were the only 2 who raised our hands. He then said that if the engineers did their jobs the products would be so good Intel wouldn’t need Sales. I reminded him of that right before I retired in 2004, he laughed and said if I was still there, he’d have to give a “Does Not Meet” to the engineering groups. There will never be his like again, and he is missed.”

Cindy Potts Doyle: He gave an orientation in a theater in Phoenix. His feet kept sticking to the sticky floor. He would lift his feet, one at a time, and the “release” was audible throughout the theatre. His expression was priceless!!!

Ted Jenkins: The loss of Andy is sad, nostalgic, and the end of an era. Even when he’s been in the audience, I’ve said before that no other company’s culture Is more an extension of an individual’s personality than Intel’s was of Andy Grove’s. We were data driven, direct, disciplined, and effective. All that was incredibly gratifying. Intel and Fairchild were fortunate to have such a complementary team of Andy Grove, Gordon Moore, and Bob Noyce.

I met Andy Grove 50 years ago this time of year, when he was one of the interviewers as I applied for a job at Fairchild R&D. I ended up getting a couple of offers, outside of his organization, and went to work in the linear integrated circuit section. I did have the good fortune of taking his semiconductor technology class. This was a great way to start in the industry. The following year I was Ed Snow’s TA for the silicon-oxidation session. Jokingly, I’ve said from time to time that I did my PhD at Fairchild R&D.

Several times at Fairchild I would see Andy arriving at work it is Austin Healey roadster. He always seemed as disciplined and focused driving his car as he was with all the other tasks in his life. He would not wave at or recognize any pedestrians. It was clear however, that he enjoyed driving that car.

When Intel was started Andy and Gordon had a bet about being able to make a bipolar transistor, a-leak-free diode, and a clean or drift-free MOS capacitor. I think the whole purpose was to get incremental motivation from the engineers that were getting the equipment and the processes running. Andy was actually betting against success; Gordon was betting for success. Thank goodness, Andy lost, and Gordon won, Years later at a retirement dinner Tom Dunlap held for me, Gordon teased Andy about losing. It would be hard to argue who was the wiser person in the bet.

Early at Intel as he had done at Fairchild R&D, Andy reviewed and edited all of the written monthly progress reports. Andy would return markups in your report to you for correction and resubmission. This happened to me several times but there’s one that is fun to recall. In my report I had mentioned that someone “corroborated” my results. Andy sent the report back to me and said you meant “collaborate” not “corroborate.” I sent the note back to him marked up saying that “corroborate” is a legitimate word. Andy wrote back after he had reviewed my answer saying that “bastard” was a legitimate word as well.

When I took over the memory division in 1986 around Andy’s 50th birthday I attended the first executive committee meeting, and he had a vote about whether or not the microprocessor revenue or the memory revenue was the larger. Dick Boucher said the microprocessor revenue was higher, I said they were about equal, and everybody else said that the memory revenue was larger. Boucher was the only correct one. Hence one of the events on the “inflection” that Andy made famous.

Keith Thompson and Gene Flath (based on secondhand information): At one of Andy’s staff meetings in Santa Clara his staff members were sitting in the corner conference room where the meeting was usually held and watching the incoming arrivals after 8 o’clock. They were teasing one another saying, “Oh, here comes your staff member. No, here comes your employee,” and while they laughed about it, Andy got angry. He didn’t like the lack of discipline; and he didn’t like the lack of integrity, if the employees were filling out their timecards and putting in eight o’clock when they were arriving after that. Shortly thereafter he locked the entrance door one morning at 8:05 and then appeared at 8:30 to explain what he had done and why to that group of employees. After that if the building had greater than 5% late arrivers the building would have to institute a late list. Everyone arriving after 8:05 had to sign the list that stayed in place until the numbers were under 5% for a month. It was the building Czar’s job to coordinate the building’s recovery to on time attendance.

Raphael Naveh: I used to work pretty closely with Andy – especially during the 5 years that I managed Intel Israel (which was the Haifa Development center – at the time).

One item that I found is – what we used to call: an Andy-gram. These were short notes that he wrote to individuals at the whim of a moment.

David Mayes: In 1975, I was a Humanities & Arts graduate who had studied for a year at Oxford, which was rapidly fading into oblivion, and whose hunt for permanent employment was going nowhere. At the suggestion of someone I cannot remember, I applied for a role at Intel. I got the interview and was eventually hired. On realizing the nature of Intel’s business, I asked the hiring manager why I had been hired. His answer was interesting. He said that he felt that I had “the aptitude” to do the job.

My first role at Intel in 1975 was to manage the daily production of “The Wafer Sort Report.” I managed a group of about two dozen women who worked across all three shifts in the Santa Clara 2 building. The report was prepared manually, each morning no later than 7 AM. The only automation was a very large Xerox copier. There were no PCs in 1975 and Intel did not use mainframe terminals. Little did I know in the beginning just how important this report was to executive management.

The daily distribution list included Gordon, Bob, Andy, Gene Flath, Les Vadez, Craig Barrett, and dozens of other engineering and manufacturing executives. Before long I became personally acquainted with all the executive admins, and over time, all the top executives. The content of the report was the dashboard of the engine of the company at the time. The wafer sort results of one run could set alarm bells ringing, bringing a dozen fab and test engineers to frantically analyze the results to identify what exactly had occurred, and to correct any problem identified as quickly as possible.

But it was Andy who most often demonstrated his daily command of the data, and his interest in manufacturing, particularly the people working around the clock in Santa Clara 2, just across the indoor bridge from his office. He was a regular sight in the temperature-controlled Test & Finish area, chatting with the operators, some of whom had no idea who he was, and even occasionally during the off-hours, which became a mood booster for the night shift folks. Andy cared about them.

Andy and I became personally acquainted simply because of The Wafer Sort Report, and he never forgot my name. Over the course of my career with Intel, later to Oregon and Marketing, I continued to receive “Andygrams” from time to time. I wish that I had kept them. In another example, many years later, I was with Jack Busch at a restaurant in Cupertino, when Gordon and his family walked in. Jack gestured to Gordon, who walked over. Jack graciously introduced me to Gordon, who immediately shook my hand, and remarked that he remembered me and that I had worked for Larry Regis and Ron Whittier. I was absolutely flabbergasted.

Andy Grove with Dan Synder Intel Christmas Party 1996

Alex Robinson: Was at Andy’s last ISMC at Anaheim. Me and a friend snuck down the front while the security guard was watching. Sat in the middle of the second row. Surrounded by executives, my country manager spotted me, smiled but did tell me to go back. Anyway, room starts to fill and Andy walks in. Takes a seat right in front of me. Things get underway, the presentations happen, and the microphone finds its way to Andy. He stood up and turned to face the crowd. He spoke for a few minutes, then turned to resume his seat. The seat base had “stood up” and Andy was heading right for the floor, he had passed the point of no return. I saw it, leaned forward, put my arms around the seat back and lowered the seat bottom JUST before Andy landed.

I even think I brushed Andy’s ass. Lol. Everyone around saw what happened, nobody said anything to Andy, and I have a story of saving Andy’s life! Yay!!!

Debbie Christofferson: Long time IT professional at Intel, and Information Security Manager at the time (and still)

My memory: Early in Information Security, probably 1992, is being in a conference room in Chandler, AZ, on a quarterly Operations Review for Corporate Security. On behalf of Information Security, I was giving the update for our team, since I resided in Chandler with the Corporate Security group. Someone on the conference call interrupts to ask: “How do I know if I need encryption?”. Encryption was being recommended for sensitive email, PGP at the time for individual email. But it was not easily understood by employees, who needed it, or how to use it, and licensing had to be individually purchased. Executives would be those who would be needing confidentially over email, in general. I didn’t know it was Andy and I asked who was speaking. “Andy Grove” was the answer. I felt like my face lost all its blood as I realized my blunder in not recognizing his distinctive voice, in the room of 25 where I was speaking. People were snickering behind their hands. Thankfully while I hesitated in what my answer would be as I recovered, … Cary Daugherty my manager, head of security before anybody thought it important enough to be C-level or CISO like today (well, in some organizations, …. Cary spoke up. He had a way of speaking in plain English, thankfully. People gave me some good jazzing over that, in the conference room in person and from security staff, mine and the group I was among, after the fact. Security has come a long way. The more automated the better, but it wasn’t so automated at the time. It’s still challenging, every single day.

Stanley Mazor: I was a business and scientific programmer at Fairchild in 1964 and transferred to Fairchild R&D in 1966. I had a few interactions with Andy who was the 2nd in command under Gordon Moore. In 1969 I joined Intel working for Ted Hoff on computer and microcomputer work. We had bought a PDP-10 computer as Intel’s first computer and although it was bought for engineering use it had some use as a business computer as I will describe here.

As Andy was in charge then of manufacturing, he recognized a problem in keeping track of wafer lots, and this is called WIP, (Work in Progress), just think about hundreds of wafer groups moving through about 60 different workstations. I had acquaintances at National Semiconductor that had a computer solution for doing this job exactly, using a handwritten card that was transcribed and entered into a batch processing computer program. I received an invitation to visit National and their tracking system. So, Andy and I visited their factory floor, and I introduced Andy as my associate. To Andy’s surprise we were given a tour of their manufacturing area and saw their WIP system being used. Andy thought their approach was antiquated and so we launched an online and real time WIP tracking system using our DEC PDP-10. We used outside staffing to do this project and it ended up being an important operating tool that he had specified.

Terry Follmer: “When I first ran into Andy, I literally ran into him. Early 1980 and he was visiting the new DV-1 (Deer Valley) in North Phoenix. I walked out of my cubicle carrying a tick computer printout (those age accordion folded things, long before there was a PC on every desk). He was shorter than the cubicle wall and we collided. A quick “sorry, excuse me: from both of us and he continued on his stroll through the building. (An early version of “management by walking around” I guess. I only realized who he was a few minutes later.”

Ron Victor: The year would have been 1994. I was then working in what was then called PCD which was headed by Pat Gelsinger.

Bill Pohlman was running the i750 development out of Chandler and I was working in his team under JC Korta and Sue Petrizzo.

PCD was heavily focused on personal conferencing solution that used ISDN modems – the communications technology was being developed by a large team in Oregon.

I had been part of original the team that had brought in the Video technology from David Sarnoff Labs in New Jersey inside of Intel a year in 1993. Most of the senior leadership and video encoding Gurus had moved to Chandler under Bill. We were a SWAT team of video encoding experts working on what was then called (VLBR) or Very Low Bit Rate video encoding headed by JC.

So, while PCD worked on ISDN we worked on POTS (Plain Old Telephone Systems) and had taken on the challenge of making video conferencing possible on simple POTS lines v/s ISDN. We were getting push back from within PCD because of the internal ISDN debate (I See Dollars Now v/s It Still Does Nothing). And here we were saying, let ISDN development take its time – in the meantime we can make this work on POTS today for the entire existing PC market……..and WE DID:)

So now we have the VLBR product developed and want to productize it on POTS but there was friction internally because of the ISDN v/s POTS debates.

I setup a 1:1 with Les and had a TME friend in Santa Clara setup a computer with Cezanne on it in Santa Clara next to the CBD office for Les to see the demo. I myself was in Chandler. So, we do a dial-up modem connection on a POTS line and there for the first time Les sees my video coming across from Chandler and we start talking. Before I even finish my first few sentences, Les hops off and says hold on and grabs Andy and brings him over. Andy sits and I explain that we in Chandler have developed this and its working on POTS et.al and this is the moment I have never forgotten…. drum roll please…. Andy’s first question to me – “Ron have we patented this???”

It always takes a visionary to see the value of a up and coming technology. Needless to say, the next day some people within PCD in Oregon were not very happy:)

Andy in Munich

Georg Albrecht: I was from 1995-1999 at Intel/Germany in Feldkirchen and met Andy several times, as I worked in the PR department and did several interviews with him in Munich and in Santa Clara.

I would love to be included in the list for the celebration of Andy.

Michael Barton: The story you remember was about a visit by Andy to GM/Delco Electronics in the early days of automobile engine control system development, circa 1979. He was on a several stop a day customer trip with Hank Josefczk (Central Region RM) who scheduled him into a dinner with the then VP/GM of Delco – Dr. Robert Costello, in Kokomo Indiana. It had been a long day of planes and cars, and Andy was, surprise, not in a relating frame of mind. As the dinner droned on, with Costello into over a half hour of talking about his son in Boy Scouts, etc., Andy decided to take command of the conversation. He interrupted him with pure Grove directness. I believe the quote was “I’m not here to talk about chicken-shit applications like window lifts.” That quote followed us for at least two decades during every sales call into GM, worldwide. But the reality is that Andy was, as usual, exactly on point. GM was the ultimate loser in early engine control systems. With Andy’s relentless focus on execution, Intel kicked GM’s ass with the Ford EEC IV system’s drivability, cost, and unprecedented reliability. We shipped 5.5 Million EEC IV CPUs to Ford in 1985, without a single failure, excellent performance, and value.

As a Side note, Costello went on to head up GM Corporate Procurement I took Gordon in to see him at GM HQ in Detroit in 1985 to discuss Intel AI/Speech technology with their EDS subsidiary. Costello kept us waiting in the vendors lobby for over an hour before having us seated in one end of a huge conference room. Costello came in and sat at the other end. He said “my name’s Dr. Robert Costello and I am responsible for over $4 Billion of yearly procurement here. What’s your story? I looked at Gordon and said, “This is Dr. Gordon Moore, Founder of Intel, and he’s responsible for Moore’s Law.” Felt good.

Jane Price: I appreciated Andy’s directness and role modeling of constructive confrontation—he focused on the business issue and not personal. I recall two instances in particular where he did not sugarcoat his response.

First, when presenting a potential ad campaign to him along with CRB and PSO, Andy responded when asked for his opinion “I was telling Paul in the restroom prior to this meeting that I had low expectations of what we would see today, and this has managed to underwhelm even my very low expectations’. Needless to say, his comments commanded everyone’s attention. When I asked, ‘tell me more, what did you hope to see?’’, he was articulate, clear and productive. We left the meeting with a clear sense of how to proceed.

Second, another time after presenting ad concepts to Andy, I asked for his reaction to them. He simply stated, “It makes me want to vomit”. Again, his words were like a taser focusing everyone’s attention. When I asked, ‘what about it that makes you want to vomit?’ Andy provided clear and extremely helpful perspective that helped the ad agency productively move forward.

I learned a lot about ‘leaning in’ from him and these encounters. And I learned that sharing ad concepts with Andy was not for the faint of heart.

Benny Ginman: My first 1-on-1 with Andy February 1987. Subject of the 1-0-1: What is Intel’s main competitive advantage?

Bernard Giroud had appointed me RM Scandinavia in December 1986. He said: Benny, Andy is in Paris, you will have a breakfast 1-on-1 with him on day x in hotel y.

I got to the hotel well ahead of time and I did check that I’m in the correct hotel.

The reception says: No Monsieur Grove. Panic!

Then, I recalled, Andy is paranoid and there were recently riots in Paris and asked is Mr. Giroud in the hotel? Yes.

Andy appears, instead of Giroud, and we did have the 1-0-1.

One hour later, Bernard is at the entrance. Andy and I get into the back seat of Bernard’s Peugeot. Bernard starts driving to the office. We, in the back seat decided that we’d better fasten the seat belts.

They had never been used before (the car was probably two years old)

Andy struggled with the buckle and eventually his hand got stuck between the rear seat and the luggage compartment.

Bernard had to bail him out, at arrival in the office, 20 minutes later.

We all survived. That time.

Akinori Kobayashi: These are pages of old IJKK employee magazine “PLAZA” from 1998. When Andy Grove as Chairman visited to Japan in May,1998, he had a seminar and Press Q&A after it as always. At this event, he highlighted Low-cost high-performance Computer and Internet moving the business in the world. IBM PCs would be connected soon.