MOORE STEPS DOWN FROM INTEL BOARD

Santa Clara, CA -- Three years before co-founding Intel Corp. in 1968, Gordon Moore predicted the number of transistors on a silicon chip would double every year.

More than 35 years later, "Moore's Law" still describes growth in the high-tech industry, as more transistors lead to more processing punch, new products and greater demand for computer power.

On Thursday, the Silicon Valley legend retired from the board of directors of Intel. He will continue serving as chairman emeritus and director emeritus but will no longer hold any voting power.

After the company's annual meeting -- during which former Federal Communications Commission Reed Hundt was elected to the company's board -- Moore said he has no regrets about instituting a mandatory retirement age for directors.

And Moore said he intends to remain at least as active in the company as he has been since giving up the chairmanship title in 1997.

"I would miss it if I really backed away. This business is really exciting. It changes so fast," he said. "If the alternative is staying home and taking out the garbage, I want to stay close to the industry."

Asked about his thoughts on the future, Moore pointed to the demands for greater processing power by scientists developing new drugs and consumers looking for better voice recognition software.

Truth be told, he added, his opinions aren't so important now.

"I don't have to worry so much about what's going to happen anymore," he said, seated next to Intel chief executive Craig Barrett and chairman Andy Grove. "The 85,000 people at Intel can worry about that."

Moore said the current economic downturn that has hammered Intel and other high-tech companies won't last forever. But, he added, no two downturns are alike.

"You've got to be careful that you're not like the generals who plan to fight the last war," he said. "You've got to look at what the characteristics are. I don't know how this one will play out."

Moore and Robert Noyce founded Intel on July 18, 1968, shortly after leaving Fairchild Semiconductor. Noyce died of a heart attack in 1990.

Experts expect Moore's Law to hold true at least through the next decade. Moore himself said Thursday that it will ultimately be limited by engineers' ability to make things smaller.

Moore's Law, which was later updated to reflect a doubling of transistors every 18 to 24 months, is expected to hold true at least through the next decade. Moore himself said Thursday that it will ultimately be limited by engineers' ability to make things smaller.

"No exponential every goes on forever without some kind of disaster happening at the end. Sure it has a limit," he said. "Materials are made of atoms, and we're not too far from where that starts to bite us."

Moore originally published his prediction as a way to show that integrated circuits would become less costly and more powerful over time.

That original idea has taken on a life of its own, he said.

"Since then, sort of anything that changes exponentially in relation to the industry is called 'Moore's Law,'" he said. "And I'm perfectly happy to take credit for all of it."

About Gordon E. Moore

Moore co-founded Intel in 1968, serving initially as Executive Vice President. He became President and Chief Executive Officer in 1975 and held that post until elected chairman and Chief Executive Officer in 1979. He remained CEO until 1987 and was named Chairman Emeritus in 1997.

Moore is widely known for "Moore's Law," in which he predicted that the number of transistors that the industry would be able to place on a computer chip would double every year. In 1995, he updated his prediction to once every two years. While originally intended as a rule of thumb in 1965, it has become the guiding principle for the industry to deliver ever-more-powerful semiconductor chips at proportionate decreases in cost.

Moore earned a B.S. in Chemistry from the University of California at Berkeley and a Ph.D. in Chemistry and Physics from the California Institute of Technology. He was born in San Francisco, Calif., on Jan. 3, 1929.

He is a director of Varian Associates, Gilead Sciences Inc. and Transamerica Corporation. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, a Fellow of the IEEE and a Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the California Institute of Technology. He received the National Medal of Technology in 1990 from then-President George Bush.

Web site: www.intel.com.