By Khalida Sarwari
Long before the likes of Google and Facebook moved in, the ROLM Corporation was one of the most enviable places to work in Silicon Valley. Boasting a campus furnished with a swimming pool, open space park areas and a recreation center, the company rewarded its employees not only financially but with incentives that today have become staples of the region’s high-tech culture.
In her new book, Starting Up Silicon Valley: How ROLM Became a Cultural Icon and Fortune 500 Company, Katherine Maxfield recounts the history of ROLM from start-up to buyout.
Maxfield spoke about the company’s past and unique culture before a crowd of about three dozen at the Montalvo Arts Center on June 17. Afterward, members of the audience said they found her stories engaging and enlightening.
Till Guldimann, a Saratoga resident and former vice chairman of SunGard Data Systems, said Maxfield’s talk made him realize just how far back the history of Silicon Valley really goes.
“I thought it was wonderful–refreshing insights from an ex-marketing professional,” said Guldimann, holding a copy of Maxfield’s book. “Even if it didn’t work out in the end, it’s a great story.”
Fellow Saratogan Micki Anderson, a retired speech therapist whose husband once worked for ROLM, commended Maxfield’s writing style, saying that she manages to deftly explain the technical elements, such as those pertaining to financial data and corporate strategy, while also telling a story that is compelling.
“I think Kathie’s very eloquent,” Anderson said. “It’s a very readable book.”
Maxfield herself has lived in Saratoga for 25 years with her husband, Robert Maxfield, one of ROLM’s four founders. She worked for technology companies for 25 years, including five years for ROLM. She said the company provided significant financial rewards for smart, successful work.
“It was a fabulous place to be if you were willing to do that,” Maxfield said.
Credited with being one of the first companies that broke from the staid corporate mold to become a company that was very different from the rest of corporate America, “ROLM originally made the world’s toughest computer for use in air, ground and sea military applications,” Maxfield wrote in an email.
The Santa Clara-based company later branched off into energy management and the telecom industry, becoming a Fortune 500 company with worldwide offices, having developed technological innovations that revolutionized both military computers and telecommunications. In 1984, ROLM was acquired by IBM.
Maxfield’s talk focused on not only what it was like to work for ROLM, but the story behind the IBM merger and the tricks played by competitor AT&T. A story Maxfield relayed about the mother of a Columbia University student leaving her son a voice message that circulated throughout the school in what she claims was the first message that went viral drew much laughter from the audience.
The biggest challenge Maxfield said she faced in the process of writing the book was getting opinions from 60 different people “of how something went down, and sometimes consensus could not be gathered.” Judging by the positive reaction from her audience, Maxfield appears to have met that challenge head-on.
Book offers look at ROLM: The original Silicon Valley start-up
