The Silicon Eye

Microchip Swashbucklers and the Future of High-Tech Innovation

7 April 2006

George Gilder (Author)

Description

Technology insider George Gilder delivers a "compelling" (Wired) look under the hood at a genius-fueled startup.

Thanks to the digital technology revolution, cameras are everywhere—PDAs, phones, anywhere you can put an imaging chip and a lens. Battling to usurp this two-billion-dollar market is a Silicon Valley company, Foveon, whose technology not only produces a superior image but also may become the eye in artificially intelligent machines. Behind Foveon are two legendary figures who made the personal computer possible: Carver Mead of Caltech, one of the founding fathers of information technology, and Federico Faggin, inventor of the CPU—the chip that runs every computer.

George Gilder has covered the wizards of high tech for twenty-five years and has an insider's knowledge of Silicon Valley and the unpredictable mix of genius, drive, and luck that can turn a startup into a Fortune 500 company. The Silicon Eye is a rollicking narrative of some of the smartest—and most colorful—people on earth and their race to transform an entire industry.

Reviews

"Like Foveon’s founders, Mr. Gilder wants to understand vision, albeit of a different kind: the vision of innovators. . . . The unpredictable disorder of markets is, in Microsoft parlance, not a bug but a feature. That’s a lesson that Mr. Gilder’s book drives home." — Wall Street Journal

"Proof that the spell of the Valley, after decades of booms and busts, is alive and well." — David Kushner, Washington Post

Also By: George Gilder View all by author...

Paperback

9780393328417

137 x 203 mm • 320 pages

£21.00

Add to Basket