TED Tuesdays: Meet the Inventor of the Electronic Spreadsheet

Today, electronic spreadsheet programs are ubiquitous, but the invention of VisiCalc was a game-changer and is credited with propelling the entire computer industry forward.

For hundreds of years, businesses were managed using spreadsheets—by hand. But in 1978, Dan Bricklin, who had worked on interactive word processing and on-demand personal computation in an era dominated by mainframe computers, had a revolutionary idea while attending Harvard Business School.

He dreamed of a “magic blackboard” where if you erased one number and wrote a new one in, all the other numbers would change automatically. Watch this engaging TED Talk, recorded November, 2016 at TEDxBeaconStreet in Brookline, MA, to learn how Bricklin’s innovative idea evolved into VisiCalc and helped bring the personal computer to the business world.

Speaker : Dan Bricklin 

Dan Bricklin is best known for codeveloping VisiCalc, the game-changing electronic spreadsheet. He is CTO of Alpha Software Corp. and president of Software Garden Inc., a small consulting firm and developer of software applications.

About TED Tuesdays

Much of the success that Business Solution Partners enjoys can be directly attributed to the insatiable drive of our consultants to learn and grow through continuing education. To stay abreast of the latest developments in business and finance, we look to though-leaders, mentors and disruptors that are shaping the future of industry. TED talks are an amazing resource that we want to share with you, our clients and friends. Come back to our blog every Tuesday for another phenomenal video from the world's brightest minds in finance and business.