"The traitorous eight are eight men who left Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory in 1957. William Shockley had in 1956 recruited a group of young PhD graduates with the goal to develop and produce new semiconductor devices. While Shockley had received a Nobel Prize in Physics and was an experienced researcher and teacher, his managing of the group created harsh working conditions.[note 1] He chose a strategy for circuit design that failed and created an intolerable working atmosphere.[note 2] The group of PhD graduates hired demanded that Shockley be replaced. When their demands were rebuffed, they realized they had to leave. Shockley described their leaving as a "betrayal". The eight who left Shockley Semiconductor were Julius Blank, Victor Grinich, Jean Hoerni, Eugene Kleiner, Jay Last, Gordon Moore, Robert Noyce and Sheldon Roberts. In August 1957 they reached an agreement with Sherman Fairchild and on September 18, 1957 they formed Fairchild Semiconductor. The newly founded Fairchild Semiconductor soon grew into a leader of the semiconductor industry. In 1960 it became an incubator of Silicon Valley, and was directly or indirectly involved in the creation of dozens of corporations such as AMD and Intel.[1] These many spin-off companies came to be known as "Fairchildren"."

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