Dan Bricklin

Dan Bricklin is a software engineer and entrepreneur who co-invented VisiCalc with Bob Frankston in 1979, the first electronic spreadsheet and one of the most consequential software applications in the history of personal computing. Developed while Bricklin was a student at Harvard Business School, VisiCalc was the original "killer app" that gave consumers and businesses a compelling reason to buy personal computers, and is widely credited with launching the personal computer industry as a commercial phenomenon. Bricklin has continued to contribute to the software industry as an entrepreneur and commentator, and remains one of the most important figures in the history of technology to have done his most consequential work in the Boston area.