William C. Lowe, the executive who supervised the creation of IBM's first personal computer, has died.
IBM CEO Frank Cary tasked Lowe with creating a plan for bringing an IBM product to market within a year, along with assembling a team that could accomplish that goal. Under the codename "Project Chess," Lowe recruited "The Dirty Dozen" -- 12 engineers who would design and build a prototype personal computer dubbed Acorn within one month.The fruit of their labor was released on August 12, 1981, when IBM launched its new computer, which had been renamed the IBM PC. Because "PC" stood for "personal computer," IBM was given credit for popularizing the term "PC."