Programmer Martin Goetz (1930-2023), the first person to receive a software patent and thus contribute to the birth of a new industry, died in the United States at the age of 93, writes The New York Times.

The fact is that in the 1950s and 1960s, software was considered an integral part of computers, at that time, of course, mainframes. But with the development of the industry, the establishment of standards, and the ability to reproduce the same software on different computers, it became clear that software was a separate industry no less important than the production of computer hardware itself.

In 1964, Martin Goetz, who worked for Applied Data Research, attended an intellectual property conference and decided that the advanced data sorting algorithm he had developed could be patented.

Data sorting was an important problem for mainframes of the time, many of which used magnetic tape for storage. A more efficient data sorting procedure could have saved a significant amount of program execution time by reducing the number of read and write operations and reducing the time spent waiting for the tape to rewind.

Goetz filed for a patent on April 9, 1965, and on April 23, 1968, he received U.S. Patent No. 3,380,029. At the time, Computerworld magazine reported the news as follows: “First software patent granted, full implications not yet clear”. Now we know the consequences of this patent – the creation of a huge industry that changed the world.

In addition to obtaining the first software patent, Martin Goetz is known as the product manager of the first commercial software – the Autoflow flowcharting package from Applied Data Research for RCA (Radio Corporation of America) mainframes. When RCA and other hardware manufacturers refused to license Autoflow, Goetz decided to sell it directly to RCA mainframe users. This is considered the first time that software was sold as a separate product.

In 2007, the same Computerworld magazine that in 1968 did not understand the consequences of granting software patents called Goetz an “unsung innovator” in the computer industry.