His ability to turn his idea of an integrated circuit into practical reality was restricted by his lack of responsibility for active devices and the lack of suitable manufacturing techniques. He got over his lack of suitable authority to commission development work by placing a small contract with Plessey under the auspices of his Constructional Techniques Group. The result was shown at The International Components Symposium he initiated at RRE Malvern in September 1957, where he presented a model to illustrate the possibilities of solid-circuit techniques. The model represented a flip-flop in the form of a solid block of semiconductor material suitably doped and shaped to form four transistors. Four resistors were represented by silicon bridges, and other resistors and capacitors were deposited in film form directly onto the silicon block with intervening insulating films. The model was intended as a design exercise, but was not too different from the circuit patented by Jack St Clair Kilby two years later.