The IEEE oral history with Gary Boone, co-inventor of the microcontroller, has been lost for over decade but is now posted on the IEEE site.  Please read the whole oral history.  Mr. Boone has a number of interesting insights.  For instance, he states that he invented microcontroller while at Texas Instruments because of boredom.  He was working in a group designing custom Integrated Circuits (ICs).  While designing these chips he began to feel “I’m tired of doing this.  I’m working long hours.  My family is not happy.  I have to find a better way of doing this.”  He also noticed that the basic requirements for all these projects were similar and this led to the idea that a general chip that was programmable could solve multiple customers’ requirements.  He also discusses the resistance in the community to this innovation.