L’elettronica italiana negli anni ’60–’70

Abstract

This writing envisages the development of Italian electronics within the ’60s and ’70s international context and is dedicated to the memory of Prof. Renato Koch, who was then Director of Research at “Fondazione U. Bordoni” and with whom the author had the pleasure to interact at the beginning of his work experience. The aforesaid development is evaluated on the basis of innovations which were introduced in the ’60s and ’70s with respect to the foregoing period and regards the most significant applications of advanced electronics already poised towards ICT objectives. More specifically, the latter include telecommunications, remote sensing, terminal apparatus, industrial automation, office automation, domotics and biomedical techniques. Among the factors most relevant to these achievements were the compactness of circuital realizations, a greater flexibility in the use of information-processing devices, the multimedial mode of information representation and the level of technical education of human resources engaged in the realization of devices and systems. Furthermore, one should also remember the importance of new transmission media, memory systems, I/O units, sensors and displays. Regarding the aforementioned applications and particularly telecommunications, a high level of innovation in all enabling factors was observed from the ’60s on into the ’70s. More specifically, this involved (i) a generalized use of microelectronic circuitry, (ii) a widespread use of microprocessors, (iii) prevalent adoption of the numerical mode for the treatment of voice, data and images (both fixed and moving) and (iv) the availability of human resources with a specific technical education. This picture of innovation in enabling factors becomes complete with the emerging need for broad-band communications, the following onset of optical fibres and the development of spatial radio transmissions.