First Principles · Institutions
Institutions
Labs, companies, universities — where the work actually happened.
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A–Z →Universities 16
University of Cambridgestub English university, home of EDSAC and of Turing's college. Princeton Universitystub American university where von Neumann, Gödel and Turing overlapped. Massachusetts Institute of Technologystub American institute whose labs seeded AI, networking and much else. Stanford Universitystub American university at the center of Silicon Valley's founding. Carnegie Mellon Universitystub American university, home of Newell, Simon and early AI. University of Torontostub Canadian university where deep learning was kept alive. New York Universitystub American university, LeCun's base for convolutional networks. Université de Montréalstub Canadian university, home of Bengio's MILA. UC Berkeleystub American university behind BSD, RISC and much of open systems. Caltechstub American institute where Carver Mead formalized VLSI. University of Oxfordstub English university, a center of modern AI safety and theory. ETH Zürichstub Swiss institute, home of Wirth and of Pascal. University of Illinois Urbana-Champaignstub American university whose NCSA produced Mosaic. University of Manchesterstub English university that ran the first stored-program computer. University of Pennsylvaniastub American university where ENIAC was built. University of Utahstub American university whose graphics program trained a generation.
Research Labs 17
Bell Labsstub AT&T's research arm — the transistor, information theory, UNIX and C. SRI (Stanford Research Institute)stub An independent research institute founded in 1946, originally affiliated with Stanford. Xerox PARCstub Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center, founded in 1970. IBM Researchstub IBM's laboratories, source of the relational model, DRAM and Deep Blue. Google Brainstub Google's deep learning group, birthplace of TensorFlow and the transformer. DeepMindstub London AI lab founded in 2010, known for AlphaGo and AlphaFold. Augmentation Research Center (ARC)stub Engelbart's laboratory at SRI, the team that built NLS and staged the 1968 demonstration. ISSCCstub The International Solid-State Circuits Conference, where Engelbart presented the similitude paper in February 1960. Bletchley Parkstub Britain's wartime codebreaking site, where Colossus ran. ARPA (now DARPA)stub The U.S. defense research agency that funded the ARPANET. CERNstub European physics laboratory where the web was invented. Los Alamos National Laboratorystub American weapons lab and early proving ground for scientific computing. NASA (Ames Research Center)stub The U.S. space agency's Silicon Valley laboratory. MIT AI Lab & Media Labstub MIT's two engines of AI, hacker culture and interface research. RAND Corporationstub American think tank where Baran designed packet switching. Homebrew Computer Clubstub The Bay Area hobbyist club that produced the Apple I. Institute for Advanced Studystub Princeton institute where von Neumann built his machine.
Semiconductor Companies 24
Shockley Semiconductorstub The 1956 company whose defectors founded Silicon Valley. Fairchild Semiconductorstub A pioneering semiconductor company founded in 1957, the seedbed of Silicon Valley. Intelstub Founded 1968; maker of the first microprocessor. AMDstub Founded 1969; Intel's long-running rival. National Semiconductorstub Fairchild spinout and analog powerhouse. Intersilstub Early analog and radiation-hardened chip maker. LSI Logicstub Pioneer of custom ASIC design. Xilinxstub Inventor of the field-programmable gate array. Alterastub FPGA maker, later absorbed by Intel. SanDiskstub Flash memory company founded in 1988. NVIDIAstub Founded 1993; the GPU company that became the AI company. TSMCstub Taiwanese foundry that manufactures most advanced chips. Qualcommstub Wireless chip and patent powerhouse founded in 1985. Texas Instrumentsstub Home of the first integrated circuit. Motorolastub Maker of the 68000 that powered the early Mac and Amiga. ARMstub British designer of the world's most-used instruction set. ASMLstub Dutch maker of the EUV machines no one else can build. Applied Materialsstub American supplier of chip fabrication equipment. Samsung Electronicsstub Korean giant in memory, displays and foundry. SK Hynixstub Korean memory maker, key supplier of HBM for AI. Micronstub American memory manufacturer founded in 1978. Broadcomstub American designer of networking and custom AI silicon. Zilogstub Faggin's company, maker of the Z80. MOS Technologystub Maker of the 6502 that powered the Apple II and NES.
Computer Companies 17
Applestub Founded 1976; the Apple II, Macintosh and iPhone. Microsoftstub Founded 1975; DOS, Windows, Office and Azure. IBMstub The company that defined the mainframe and then the PC standard. Sun Microsystemsstub Workstation and Java company founded in 1982. Oraclestub Database company founded in 1977. Ciscostub Router company that built the commercial internet's plumbing. Dellstub Direct-sales PC maker founded in 1984. HPstub The original Silicon Valley garage company, founded 1939. DECstub Digital Equipment Corporation, maker of the PDP and VAX. Commodorestub Maker of the best-selling Commodore 64. Ataristub Arcade and console pioneer founded in 1972. Compaqstub PC-compatible maker whose clean-room BIOS broke IBM's lock. Silicon Graphicsstub Workstation maker that brought 3D graphics to film and science. Xeroxstub The copier company that invented the future and sold none of it. Xerox Data Systems (XDS)stub Scientific Data Systems, bought by Xerox in 1969 and shut in 1975 — which is why PARC handed a personal computer to a company that had just quit computing. Sperry / UNIVACstub Maker of the first commercial computer line. Nintendostub Japanese company that rebuilt the console industry after 1983.
Internet & Software Companies 22
Netscapestub Founded 1994; the browser that opened the web to everyone. Googlestub Founded 1998; search, ads and much of the modern stack. Amazonstub Founded 1994; the store that became the cloud. Yahoostub The web's first great directory and portal. eBaystub Founded 1995; the internet's first great marketplace. PayPalstub Payments company whose alumni seeded a generation of startups. Adobestub PARC spinout behind PostScript, Photoshop and PDF. Salesforcestub Founded 1999; the company that proved software as a service. VMwarestub Founded 1998; virtualization that made the cloud possible. Red Hatstub The company that made open source an enterprise business. GitHubstub Where the world's source code lives. Metastub Facebook, Instagram and the largest open model program. Netflixstub Mail-order DVDs turned streaming and cloud-native architecture. Twitter / Xstub The public square that reshaped news and politics. Uberstub Ride-hailing company that defined the gig economy. Airbnbstub Marketplace that turned homes into lodging. Stripestub Payments infrastructure for the internet economy. Teslastub Electric vehicle maker and unlikely AI hardware company. SpaceXstub Launch company that made rockets reusable. Pixarstub The graphics company that became a film studio. AOLstub The on-ramp that brought millions online. Wikipediastub The encyclopedia anyone can edit, founded 2001.
AI Companies 14
OpenAIstub Founded 2015; GPT, DALL·E and ChatGPT. Anthropicstub Founded 2021; Claude and Constitutional AI. Google DeepMindstub Google's merged AI research organization. Meta AIstub Meta's research lab and home of the Llama models. xAIstub Musk's AI company, founded 2023. Mistral AIstub French lab known for efficient open-weight models. Coherestub Canadian company focused on enterprise language models. Hugging Facestub The open model hub and community. Stability AIstub Company behind Stable Diffusion. Scale AIstub Data labeling and evaluation infrastructure for AI. Inflection AIstub Consumer AI company founded by Suleyman. Midjourneystub Image generation studio with a distinctive house style. Perplexitystub AI-native search company. Symbolicsstub Lisp machine maker whose collapse marked the first AI winter.
Venture Capital 9
Kleiner Perkinsstub Founded 1972; backed Genentech, Netscape and Google. Sequoia Capitalstub Founded 1972; backed Apple, Cisco and Google. Andreessen Horowitzstub Founded 2009; the firm that made VCs into media. Khosla Venturesstub Founded 2004; deep tech and early OpenAI backer. Benchmarkstub Small, equal-partnership firm behind eBay and Uber. Accelstub Early backer of Facebook and Slack. Greylockstub One of the oldest American venture firms. Y Combinatorstub The accelerator that industrialized seed funding. SoftBank Vision Fundstub The largest technology fund ever raised.