Each day, Benzinga takes a look back at a notable market-related moment that occurred on this date.
What Happened? On Feb. 7, 1958, the U.S. Department of Defense founded the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.
Where Was The Market? The S&P 500 was at 41.73 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average stood at 448.76.
What Else Was Going On In The World: In 1958, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration was established and Fairchild Semiconductors invented the first microchip. Average monthly rent in the U.S. was $92.
DARPA Money: DARPA, which was originally called the Advanced Research Projects Agency, was created to help the U.S. develop technology to compete with Russia in the Cold War. Russia launched the Sputnik 1 satellite in 1957, and it’s no surprise the U.S. began heavily investing in technology projects shortly thereafter.
Over the years, DARPA funding has played a key role in the development of major new technology. J.C.R. Licklider, who served as ARPA’s head of the Information Processing Techniques Office, played a critical role in the development of the ARPANET in the 1960s. The ARPANET was the first computer network to use the protocol suite TCP/IP, which was later used as the technical basis of the internet.
Sun Microsystems, which was acquired by Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL) in 2010, snagged its first major contract from DARPA. Silicon Graphics also notched its first major contract from DARPA.
As of 2019, DARPA had an annual budget of nearly $3 billion. DARPA has more than 200 different programs exploring a number of different science and engineering goals. These projects include cancer research, weapons research, protein design, remote-controlled insects, neural implants and high-productivity computing systems.
A rendering of the DARPA experimental spaceplane. Courtesy photo.
