On the 100th Birthday of IBM

On the 100th Birthday of IBM Family ties
Probably the oldest IT company is celebrating a centennial. Was the success of the company over the first decades of clever marketing efforts of its leaders is due, in recent years, the shift to software and services, the reason for the continuing success of Big Blue.
  Image: IBM IBM celebrates the centennial anniversary on June 16. The date goes to the association, founded by Herman Hollerith, "Tabulating Machine Company" with the "International Time Recording Company" and "Computing Scale Corporation" back. The products manufactured by the company's products were not similar, but not so very different, because all were, or were something. While earning the new "Computing Tabulating and Recording Company" (CTR), especially with their money Hollerith punch-card systems, but also scales, Tabuliermaschinen, clocks and typewriters were part of the portfolio. IBM is the company since 1924. The new name International Business Machines should reflect the increasing internationalism.
  Thomas Watson (right) - pictured here with his predecessor George W. Fairchild - coined until the '50s, the image of IBM. Image: IBM sustainable than the creation of the CTR was to prove three years later, the appointment of Thomas J. Watson, president. With him stood until 1952, a man at the helm of the company, which was to mark on a paternalistic way, the company's fortunes. In addition to focusing on a strong sales culture Watson has called for unconditional loyalty to the company. Watson led early on the one hand, a social and training opportunities for the workforce, on the other hand, a strict dress code were made of dark suit unit, hats and suspenders for the everyday workers. Not to forget that hundreds of elite-point club, strict alcohol ban, corporate anthems to brisk marching music ("Ever Onward IBM") and an inflationary use of the motto THINK! appear with the IBM Watson family-like cult as supreme High Priest outsiders allowed.
  Everywhere: The IBM Think Motto! - Here the entrance of the School House in IBM Endicott. Image: IBM had in the 30s, IBM achieved a monopoly on punch card systems. Other providers aggregated recorded less than 10 percent of the total market. The result was an anti-trust suit against IBM, which so far had little impact on the revenues of the company since winning at the time the bureaucracy in business importance (keyword: introduction of social security funds) and to an increased demand led to punch cards. Also, many states recognized the importance of statistical surveys among their citizens. Again, increasing IBM's punch cards were used. Even the Nazi regime in Germany, initially sympathized with the Watson did. About Dehomag (German Hollerith Machine Company), IBM took an ambivalent position in this case. On the one hand the subsidiary supplying the Nazi regime with billions of punch cards, adding that the Jewish people could efficiently capture, which helped the Nazis, then the logistical implementation of the Holocaust. IBM also knew a way to continue even after the entry of the United States through its European headquarters in Switzerland, the business of Dehomag. On the other hand were in IBM's factories produced munitions for the Allies, and IBM's researchers also contributed to reducing the high level of ship losses by German U-boats.
On the way to the IT group Watson showed initially skeptical about the development of computers, IBM began after the Second World War, especially in collaboration with the development of the new university institution computer market. In particular, under the aegis of his son, Thomas Watson Jr., who took over in 1952, the company management, Big Blue reach a number of groundbreaking discoveries and developments in the environment. Only mentioned the first standardized programming language Fortran, and of course the mainframe architecture system / 360, which IBM was the dominant company in the segment, and indeed were so dominant that the antitrust authorities have been repeatedly activated.
  In the aegis of Thomas Watson Jr. saw the launch of System/360-Rechnerfamilie. Image: IBM For years protracted antitrust litigation, errors in management and the loss of importance of the mainframe business in favor of the PC market, IBM could be the beginning of the 90s slide into a deep crisis, with losses in the billions. The future of the IT giant was at stake. With Louis Gerstner Jr., IBM was the first time a so-chief determines that did not come from within its own ranks. Gerstner designed to sedate than the current IBM and prescribed her a rigid austerity. He also took the focus away from then on the hardware business and into services (open source) software. On the prioritization of the Global Services division, which employs still more than half of the employees, should also Gerstner's successor, Samuel J. Palmisano change anything, who heads the company since 2002.
  Samuel J. Palmisano, IBM stands for about a decade ago as CEO. In his time of falling sales of Lenovo and the acquisitions of Cognos, and Rational. Image: IBM's Palmisano fall in time to sell the PC business to Lenovo, and the acquisitions of the consulting firm Price Waterhouse Coopers (PWC) and large software companies like Rational and Cognos. IBM to Sun was also interested, but had a disadvantage compared to Oracle. For the two companies now work together to further the development of Java. Was it the merger with CTR about 1300 employees, IBM has around 400,000. Big Blue is thus probably not only the oldest "IT Group", but also the largest workforce in the industry. Currently, IBM is on massive data analysis, and as the newest flagship - at least the media - should serve the supercomputer Watson, defeated the beginning of the year in the U.S. quiz show Jeopardy, two former winners clearly. Him, of course, is named after after the first influential president, and the associated processing of large amounts of data, it is now marketing. But this is just a task to complete a successful second century. Literature Kevin Maney, Steve Hamm, Jeffrey M. O'Brien, Making the World Work Better: The Ideas That Shaped a Century and a Company, IBM Press, 2011 Edwin Black, IBM and the Holocaust; Propylaea 2001 Gotz Aly, Karl Heinz Roth, the residue-free recording. People counting, identifying, screening, sorting in National Socialism, Red Book-Verlag, 1984 William Rodgers, The IBM Saga, a company changing the world, Hoffmann und Campe, 1971 Peter Muehlbauer; The rehabilitation of the giants; article on strange image change by IBM Konrad Lischka, demonization and facts, review of Edwin Black's "IBM and the Holocaust"