Extending Moore's Law

Gordon Moore
Photo courtesy Intel

Gordon Moore, a physical chemist working in electronics, made a prediction in 1965, that computer processing power, or the number of transistors on an integrated chip, would double every 18 months. While he made that prediction just four years after the first planar integrated circuit was discovered, he proved visionary. "Moore's Law," as it was called by the media, has held firm.

But will Moore’s Law continue to stand? Experts—and Moore himself —believe that technological breakthroughs are needed if this trend is to continue. To sustain Moore's Law, transistors must be scaled down to at least nine nanometers by 2016, according to the Consortium of International Semiconductor Companies. If this is achieved, future chips will have billions of transistors.

For consumers, continued progress means faster computing and greater data storage. As for cost, consider that a single transistor cost $1 in 1968; today the cost is $1 per 50 million transistors.

In 1965, 30 transistors were put on a single chip. Just six years later, Intel introduced its first chip, which held 2,000 transistors. Today's chips have 40 million transisitors with feature sizes ranging from 130 to 180 nanometers, and Intel recently announced that it has broken into the nanoscale with transistors whose smallest features are just 90 nanometers wide.

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In "Cramming more components onto integrated circuits," published in 1965, Moore predicted a doubling of computer processing power, or the number of transistors on a chip, every 18 months.

Moore updated his predictions in February 2003. Read the recent paper by Gordon Moore, No exponential is forever.

See also Intel's timeline of transistor growth in the number of transistors per integrated circuit.

International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors 2003 Edition was created by semiconductor industry organizations from key countries. The roadmap is one for sustaining Moore's law.

Gordon Moore co-founded Intel Corporation in 1968. Today he is the company's Chairman Emeritus.