Transitron Electronic Corporation was a semiconductor device fabrication company of the United States. It was founded by Leo and David Bakalar incorporated in Wakefield, Massachusetts, in 1952. David Bakalar was the president from 1952 to 1984. In 1986 the company went out of business, failing to keep pace with the rapid advances in technology.[1][2][3][4]
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Transcription
I was a member and fraternity brother of Phi Gamma Delta, which is a great house. So all of the social aspects of it, the fraternity aspects of it, and the academic, it was a wonderful four years. In 1957 when I was about to graduate from the University of Rhode Island, it was obviously a very exciting time. I was about to become engaged to my high school girlfriend, and I had made the decision to go on to graduate school. Before the end of the first year, I realized that physics research was probably not something I wanted to do, and so I was looking around to see what was available and I decided to leave school and go into industry. One company interviewed, which was called Transitron Electronics, was in the semiconductor business, and I knew enough at the time to realize that that had the potential to be a very, very strong industry, although it was in its infancy. So between 1968 and 1975 we lived five years out of the country. We lived in Hong Kong, we lived in Munich, and we lived in Singapore, and it was really a great experience. The kids, our youngest son started first grade in Hong Kong, he did second, third grade in Munich, fourth and fifth in California, and sixth and seventh back in Singapore. But in the back of my mind I had always had the goal to run my own company. And I left National with three other individuals who were very, very strong engineering people and we started a company. We started a company called Sierra Semiconductor, and we got our first venture capital funding in 1984. January, as I recall. From the career point of view it's very clear, find work that you absolutely love. And if you love it, then go work very hard at it. And how you'll know that, is if, and it's the way I felt for years, every morning when you get up, if you can not wait to get to the job, then you know you're in the right job.
History
The company was established at the time of the economic boom in Massachusetts.[1] Its first successful product was the gold bonded germanium diode, widely used in computers, military equipment, etc.[3] After that the company manufactured silicon rectifiers (which David claims were the world's first ones), grown junction silicon NPN transistors,[5] silicon diodes, germanium diodes, silicon/germanium micro-diodes, silicon references, silicon regulators, silicon controlled rectifiers, bilateral switching diodes, etc.[6]
At its heyday Transitron employed 1,600 people.[2] In 1959 Time Magazine reported it was number 3 American semiconductor company, after Texas Instruments and General Electric,[7] while Fortune Magazine placed it at number 2, with estimated 1959 sales of $40 million.[8] A number of senior industry persons, including Wilfred Corrigan, Dave Fullagar, Pierre Lamond, Nick DeWolf, George Wells, and Thomas Longo used to work in Transitron.[8]
In December 1959 the company went public, with IPO of 1,000,000 shares at $36 each. The first week closed at $43 per share.[7]
After going out of business, David Bakalar devoted his time to sculpture; see Renaissance (1989)[9] and TV Man or Five Piece Cube with Strange Hole (1993).
References
- ^ a b "Transitron Electronic Corporation » AntiqueTech".
- ^ a b "The Demise Of Transitron", The New York Times
- ^ a b "David Bakalar - Transistor Museum Historic Profile"
- ^ "A SURVEY OF EARLY POWER TRANSISTORS by Joe A. Knight TRANSITRON 1950s/60s GERMANIUM AND SILICON POWER TRANSISTORS"
- ^ "Transistor Museum Historic Profile David Bakalar Transitron Page 2".
- ^ "Transistor Museum Historic Profile David Bakalar Transitron Page 11".
- ^ a b "Corporations: The Transistor Tycoons"
- ^ a b "Companies", at the Computer History Museum
- ^ "David Bakalar - Sculptor".
This page was last edited on 7 March 2023, at 20:47