Bob Frankston

Bob Frankston graduated from MIT receiving SB Degrees in both Computer Science and Mathematics in 1970 and Masters and Engineers Degrees in Computer Science (and EE) in 1974. He did graduate work at Project MAC, where he was involved in the Multics project. From 1966-1979 he worked at White-Weld and Company in their computer research division in various roles doing systems design and implementation. White-Weld was one of the earliest financial information services and used the Scientific Data Systems 940 to provide time-sharing services. White-Weld later became Interactive Data Corporation. At IDC, he developed tools on their own version of IBM's VM system. These projects included an interactive debugger and a VM-based mail system (predating Profs). Mr. Frankston consulted for ECD Corporation in 1977 and developed a very extended Basic for their multiprocessor 6502-based system. In 1979 Mr. Frankston founded Software Arts with Dan Bricklin to develop and sell VisiCalc. VisiCalc was the first electronic spreadsheet program and remained a widely used program for personal computers for many years. From 1985-1990, he worked in Lotus Development, where he created the Lotus Express product and a Fax facility for Lotus Notes. At Slate Corporation, from 1990-1992, Frankston worked on mobile and pen-based systems. Working at Microsoft Corporation from 1993-1998, he focused on the consumer use of computers, in particular, home networking, and the idea of "No New Wires Networking."