Bringing Computing to People: The Broadening Challenge

In comparison with other industrial sectors, the US information industry has been extraordinarily successful, and our opportunities have never been brighter. Yet, we are beset with challenges concerning technology, competition , and resources of capital, people, and knowledge. Although the computer industry, overall, is doing rather well in an economy that's in trouble, the semiconductor industry, unfortunately, is more of a participant in that trouble, and both areas are facing strong and growing competition from around the world-the most impressive coming from the Japanese and what they are doing with collaborators in the US and Europe. Our country is engaged in a debate over economic policy-especially, whether to continue deliberately seeking to control inflation by slowing down economic growth rather than by measures designed to increase productivity. That debate bears directly on the concerns of our industry. For the US clearly has a serious productivity problem , and the information industry is right out front in a position to help with that problem. The long-term question is: If the information industry is really going to be the lever on our national productivity, what does the United States have to do to make that pos-sible? The problem is primarily one of human resources, but from a technology point of view, the two key issues are microelectronics capability and the software and end-user interface. Technology leadership in the information industry depends critically on both. Microelectronics The challenge. Leadership in microelectronics is both a strategic asset to industrialized countries and essential to a leading position in information technology. One cannot compete in the broad range of computer products without access to large-scale integrated circuits, nor can VLSI chips be fabricated without computer-based automated design, manufacturing, and test systems.