A profile of Dr. Shih Chin-tay, who led Taiwan's foray into chip production in the 1970s after joining the Industrial Technology Research set up in Hsinchu (Rupert Wingfield-Hayes/BBC)

Rupert Wingfield-Hayes / BBC:

A profile of Dr. Shih Chin-tay, who led Taiwan’s foray into chip production in the 1970s after joining the Industrial Technology Research set up in Hsinchu  —  When 23-year-old Shih Chin-tay boarded a plane for the United States in the summer of 1969, he was flying to a different world.