On this day in 1956 Chinese-American computer engineer and inventor An Wang sold his patent for magnetic core memory to IBM. The core memory is considered one of the most important inventions in computer history. IBM had started using Ferrite cores in their systems, but the same core had already been patented by Wang. This led to an interesting legal battle, which ended in IBM purchasing the patent from Wang for $500,000. Wang later used this money to build up his own computer company, Wang Laboratories.
