Digital Equipment Corp. founder Ken Olsen founder passed away on Sunday at the age of 84. He was the father of the minicomputer industry and perhaps the single most prominent Boston-based business titan when I was growing up there in the 1970s and 1980s–and the decline and fall is a sobering reminder of what happens when a company’s leaders can’t figure out where the future of the industry is.
The New York Times has a good obituary.