Masaru Ibuka

Masaru Ibuka (井深 大 Ibuka Masaru, April 11, 1908, Nikkō City, Japan – December 19, 1997, Tokyo) was a Japanese electronics industrialist. He co-founded what is now Sony.

He graduated in 1933 from Waseda University. After graduating, he went to work at Photo-Chemical Laboratory, a company which processed movie film. He later served in the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War 2, being a member of the Imperial Navy Wartime Research Committee. In 1946, he left the company and navy, and founded a radio repair shop in Tokyo.

In 1946 Ibuka and Akio Morita co-founded Sony Corporation, originally named Tokyo Telecommunications Engineering Corporation (prior to 1958). Ibuka was instrumental in securing the licensing of transistor technology to Sony from Bell Labs in the 1950s, thus making Sony one of the first companies to apply transistor technology to non-military uses. Ibuka served as president of Sony from 1950 to 1971, and then served as chairman of Sony between 1971 and 1976.

Read more about Masaru Ibuka:  Death, Writing