Just received a copy of The Cambridge Phenomenon by Kate Kirk and Charles Cotton with a foreword by Bill Gates that gives us a timeline of the evolution of Silicon Fen over the last half century. You can see a timeline on the associated website.
From the first home computer to the ARM chip in almost every mobile phone, from the sequencing of the human genome to the development of ‘magic bullet’ drugs, ideas developed by the technology cluster in Cambridge have changed the world in which we live:
- Over 20 billion ARM based chips shipped, found in almost all the world’s mobile phones.
- IVF, now responsible for over 4 million babies worldwide.
- Acorn BBC micro, used almost universally in British schools from its birth into the 1990s.
- Kinect hands-free control technology for Xbox 360.
- The world’s first webcam, was pointed at the coffee pot in the computer science department of the University of Cambridge.
- Concorde’s drooping nose cone and retracting visor.
- Sinclair ZX80, the world’s first affordable home computer.
- Sequencing of the human genome, creating knowledge for a new generation of medicine.
- In-flight refuelling capability, for Hercules aircraft developed in 19 days during Falkland’s War Crisis.
- Iris Recognition used in cross-border control worldwide.