This is the sad story of Geoffrey Dummer, a radar engineer based at the British Ministry of Defence's research site in Malvern, Worchester. If ever the old adage about being in the wrong place at the wrong time was true about anyone, he would have to be in the running.Dummer, who is sometimes described as the 'Prophet of the Integrated Circuit', was born in the small town of Lacock situated in the Wiltshire countryside, back in the spring of 1909. He was educated at Regent Polytechnic, London, before going to study electrical engineering at Manchester College of Technology in 1931. He married his childhood sweetheart, Dorothy, in 1933, and they had a son Stephen two years later. After received his degree he joined the Royal Radar Establishment (RRE), based in the English border town of Malvern.

Geoffrey's war

He worked on the development of automatic gain-to-range control for the Royal Air Forces radar systems, thus enhancing the span of how far they could track aircraft. He also created the plane position indicator, which was used to observe the first ever ground controlled aircraft interception, and built simulators that gave air crews experience of radar without the huge expense of actual flying time. During the Second World War he was made Group Leader of the Trainer Design Group, and under his guidance some two thousand trainer machines were constructed. This was the equivalent of four thousand aircraft doing two million miles of training manoeuvres, and saved the British Government over fifty million pounds.For his assistance in helping secure the Allied victory, Dummer was to receive the MBE (Member of the British Empire) in 1945. The following year he became a fellow of the IEE (Institute of Electrical Engineers), it would have happened sooner but his defence work prevented him from being part of such an organisation during wartime.The first published reference made to the possibility of constructing integrated circuits, was made by Dummer, in May 1952. At the Symposium on Progress in Quality Electronic Components, held in Washington DC he told the audience "with the advent of the transistor and the work in semiconductors generally, it seems now possible to envisage electronic equipment in a solid block with no connecting wires" What he foresaw was a block that would "consist of layers of insulating, conducting, rectifying, and amplifying materials. The electrical functions being connected directly by cutting out areas of various layers."

Policy of integration

Before the end of that year, he bought together a plan to create a fully integrated device, like the one he had described, while in the USA. He proposed to put a complete circuit on to a piece of silicon roughly a centimetre square, and started to build a basic prototype. Over the next few years he attempted to perfect his model, and constructed a whole electronic circuit on a single chip. He managed to get his department to back the scheme at first, but they soon lost interest. He was to fall foul of arguments that would later be proved incorrect. It was considered that such things were just too costly to produce, and they were not as good as the separate components they were looking to replace, so what was the point? With incredible foresightedness on the part of the British government, the project was finally axed, and his efforts had come to nothing. All funding was officially stopped in 1957.Dummer was just a few years off with his timing. Had he voiced his ideas a few years further down the line, when the need for integration was starting to make sense, and he had been in a more forward thinking environment, he probably would have been on to a winner. I personally would like to think that it would not have mattered if he had been in the USA or in Britain, but let us be honest, it probably still would have been a struggle to convince anyone in the Ministry of Defence of the potential that such devices would have.It is the same old story; Britain's potential for greatness being scuppered by lack of financial support. Just as we have been responsible for creating the sports (almost without exception) that are played around the globe, yet are still totally awful and nearly all of them, our nation's ability to reap the rewards of its citizen's inventiveness has gone awry on many occasions. To continue the sporting analogy a little further, Dummer had basically managed to give the UK a five year head start in the development of the integrated circuit, but ststill managed to come in un-placed at the end.It is a pity that when they pulled the plug on his research, Dummer did not think about trying to develop thing further on the other side of the Atlantic. There is a good chance that he would have found more accommodating surroundings there.After the horse had bolted, the RRE renewed its efforts in the research of integrated circuits, and it was there that in 1960, the first devices of this kind in Europe were to be produced, but that was little consolation for Dummer. Nevertheless he did become the continent's most esteemed spokesperson on semiconductor development, chairing many important conferences, and publishing a series of books.Finally retiring from the RRE in 1966, and Dummer began a new life as a consultant. He worked into his eighties, until a stroke in 1999 finally prevented him from continuing. His first wife died in 1992, but Geoffrey remarried again not long after. His second wife, June, caring from him until he died in February 2002, at the age of ninety-three. For over three decades the United States ruled the semiconductor world, and even in modern times, when it has had to share the power with SE Asia and Japan, it is still one of the most important countries in this sector. Britain, which could have pre-empted the whole technology movement, if it had listened to Dummer, lost out on all this, as it had with so many other things.So what is it about us limeys? Are the population of this 'sceptred isle' intrinsically easy to rip off, do we have some sort of metaphysical 'L' stamped on our forehead at birth? Well possibly. It has to be said that we do tend to still live up to the old stereotypical characteristics. I think it is great that we keep a strong sense of fair play and more often than not try to do the honourable thing, but there are times when it certainly does not do us any favours. Maybe we need to toughen up a bit and have more courage in our convictions. Otherwise perhaps more innovations will pass us by.

Special thanks

EPN would like to show its gratitude to the staff at the library of the Institute of Electrical Engineers, Savoy Place, London, for all their help in compiling information for this article.

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