LED, or Light Emitting Diode, came to life in 1962 under the roof of General Electric. Nick Holonyack, a consulting engineer for the company at the time, was working on a LASER, which led to a way more profound invention than Nick anticipated – the first red LED. He used gallium arsenide phosphide as a substrate for the diode.
Years have passed before other LED colors came to be and the technology became readily available to an average consumer. Today, Nick Holonyack holds 41 different patents, including the laser diode and the first-ever light dimmer.