Thank You, IBM … Here’s To Another 100 Years
Thank You, IBM … Here’s To Another 100 Years
I do what I do because of one company … IBM. Why? Because in the 1970s, I got into computers, with a ZX81 (1KB of RAM) and a Dragon 32 (32 KB of RAM). They were very much home computers, and where you would rush out and buy the latest computer magazine, and then spend a happy evening entering some BASIC code that made a cursor move across the screen using the IJLM keys. If you were very lucky you would manage to save it to a cassette — that could take over ten minutes to save a simple program — only to get an error at the end. I was hooked!
But, at work, we had a DEC VAX minicomputer, and which cost a fortune to buy and maintain (even in those days). This mini ran typically Pascal, and I remember running labs for students, and where they all decided to compile their program at the same time, and 30 minutes later, some of them would get their errors, and have to compile it again. Basically, every lab ended with me saying, “Sorry about that.”
The VAX, though, was not designed to support 25 students compiling their program at the same time … it was a batch processing machine and wanted to be given jobs that it could run whenever it had time. It basically came from the days when you handed in your punch cards (containing either FORTRAN if you were an engineer or COBOL if you were more business-focused) to someone with a white coat, and then came back the next week with a printed output with green lined paper.
But, just in time, the IBM PC arrived, and it was heavy but beautiful. So, as many in my department pushed for the VAX, but pushed for the PC for our labs. With their clock speed of 4.7 MHz, and 640KB of memory, I went ahead and bought a batch for a new PC lab. In those days there were no network switches, so they all connected with coaxial cable and had T-pieces to connect to the shared Ethernet bus. My logic was that we were paying around £20K for maintenance on the VAX, and where we could buy 20 £1K PC clones for the same cost. But, we’d have to maintain them. And, it worked. It freed us, and allowed us to run the classic Turbo Pascal (and Turbo C):
Our student could now bring in their 5-inch floppy disks and save their programs for later use. And the size of the hard disk? 20MB!
And, so, it is to IBM that we turn in starting the PC revolution, and today is the 100th anniversary of the IBM name — and first defined on 15 Feb 1924.
SQL
For decades, it was IBM who were at the forefront of computing, and who conducted world-leading research. And, so, in 1957, they created one of the first programming languages: FORTRAN — aka FORTRAN 57. At that time there were no large-scale computer disks, but where the program was stored on punch cards:
Figure: https://wp.ufpel.edu.br/diehl/files/2016/05/f90_lec1.pdf
FORTRAN received a major boost in 1977 with the creation of FORTRAN 77. The language was good at translating maths formulas into code, but not so good at building databases. And, so, it was in 1970 that Edgar Frank Codd published one of the most significant papers ever published in the world of software:
The paper outlined the world of relational databases — and which spawned the SQL programming language. Codd was awarded the Turning Award (the Nobel Prize of Computing) for his work in 1981.
In the paper, Edgar proposed a new way of modeling data and used relationships — aka tables. This allowed us to change data within certain tables without affecting other tables — all of the existing methods at the time involved new data disrupting the complete organisation of the data in the database. The tables themselves are arranged in rows and columns, and where the columns represent attributes of the data. It took until 1973 before Codd had the opportunity to scale up his work. Up to this point, Codd had defined his query system using the mathematical notation:
The drive was then to codify the maths, and it was Don Chamberlin and Ray Boyce who created a query language for relational databases based on Codd’s algebraic notation. This led to SQUARE (Specifying Queries as Relational Expressions), and then Sequel (Structured English Query Language), and which was finally renamed SQL:
In 1974, Ray Boyce — at the age of 26 — died soon after the initial creation of SQL, and never saw the true impact of his work. Over the years, SQL has taken off in ways that could never have been imagined.
Cryptography
IBM, too, is a renowned world leader in cryptography and is developing an amazing platform for trust with its Hyperledger project. The roots of their lead can be traced back to the creation of the Feistel cipher and which implements a symmetric key method.
In the 1960s, though, most of the cryptography research was conducted by governments, but IBM spotted a commercial opportunity and set up a cryptography research group in their Yorktown Heights, NY laboratory (named after IBM’s founder — Thomas J. Watson Sr.). The lab went on to produce amazing advancements such as DRAM, the relational database and the FORTRAN programming language:
One of their best recruits was Horst Feistel, a physicist turned cryptographer, and who joined them in the 1970s. His work led to the creation of the Lucifer and DES (Data Encryption Standard) ciphers:
In the early 1970s, IBM patented the Lucifer cipher and which was then used by Lloyds Bank within some of the first ATM cash dispensers. After an evaluation by the NSA, Lucifer’s key size was reduced from 112 bits to 56 bits, after which it was published as the DES standard in 1975. DES then became mandatory within its usage within US government electronic fund transfers and went on to become a de-facto international standard.
TW Jr
IBM has thus survived for over 100 years and is still one of the top companies in the world. My first proper computer was an IBM XT, and my first core academic leadership task was to replace our VAX computer with a lab of IBM XT computers. Several academics disagreed with the switch-over, but I could only see the rise of the PC, and the fall of the minicomputer. Since then, PCs have ruled our world, along with DOS, Windows and x86 architectures.
And, so, I recently read about the person who really made IBM the company they are now: Tom Watson Jr [here]:
It is a wonderful book, and I enjoyed living the life of Tom’s father and of Tom. There are possibly few people on the planet who lived such an impactful life. Overall, Tom had difficulty following in his father’s shadow and was continually accused of being favoured for promotion and in his roles at IBM. But Tom Jr did not want this. He wanted to make his own way in life, but within the company that his father had crafted. Overall, Tom Watson has taken IBM to the point where they dominated in the punch card market and had worldwide sales. This growth happened during wartime, when the company benefited from the data processing requirement of war. Some point to the fact that IBM helped the Nazis, but the book outlines that this was overblown and that it was one of the subsidiary companies that provided the data processing requirement for the Nazis.
And, so, the company grew in the 1950s, and it was time for a change. This happened through the invention of the transistor at Bell Labs. For IBM, their core markets were tabulators and punch cards, and the rise of the transistor challenged their domination. But, as TW Jr took over the CEO role from his father, he immediately put into place a massive scale-up of R&D, and a focus on transistorized computers. It was radical. At the time, the major problem in the industry was compatibility between computers, and where software had to be rewritten for every new computer and where there was no compatibility between systems and in their component parts. This created great expense for IBM — as they were required to maintain all of their previous systems — and where customer service was always a key focus for the company.
And, so, TW Jr bet the company on one thing … the IBM System/360:
In fact, it was the most costly investment in a product ever! It was to be beautifully engineered but built with a compatible architecture and using software compilers. And, too, it would cope with scientific and business processing. For this, IBM pushed their research with the new programming languages of FORTRAN 77 and COBOL and with their data structure work on SQL. The System/360 also brought DOS (Disk Operation System), and which allows disk storage systems to integrate with the operating system.
And, IBM believed in good industry design and that engineering excellence was at their core. This fed making computers that looked amazing, and where some companies would even have a server room in their company’s reception area, and which had glass windows so people could see the magnificence of their IBM computer. This focus on industrial design is apparent from the classic logo:
For the System/360, TW Jr brought together three research labs in a focus in building the state-of-the-art. But, in some places, it did not go well, especially due to delays in electronics manufacturing. In fact, JW Jr ended up moving his brother away from the leadership of manufacturing, and which ended up being one of the great regrets that JW Jr had in his life (as his brother hardly spoke to him after that).
But the gamble worked, and in 1964 it was released, and it changed the computer industry. In fact, the System/360 product range ran for another 14 years (1979), before IBM placed its main competitor (the IBM PC) in its way. In the 1980s, after TW Jr had left his role as CEO, IBM made the mistake of getting a small company named Microsoft to take over DOS (Disk Operating System) and for Intel to take over their architecture.
In the days before Steve Jobs and Apple, it was IBM who was a leader in making beautifully crafted systems and which had a continual focus on the customer. It is strange, then, that Steve’s main target in the rise of Apple was the mighty IBM (and their almost complete dominance of the computer market) — and it was the System/360 which created a virtual monopoly in the market.
Over TW Jr rein, the company made many of their employees rich — as they were one of the first companies to offer share options to their employees. They also looked after their staff and offered salaries to all of their employees (in a time when a salary was an unusual thing for some roles). Also, TW Jr set up IBM plants in areas with high deprivation and offered good jobs in the growing computer industry. Staff, too, had a job of life and some of the best salaries in the industry — along with IBM investing in the education of their staff.
But, it was TW Jr as the person that the book really focuses on, and his continual strive for perfection in his business life. Unfortunately, those around him could be the target of his anger, and it was only later in life that he managed to tame his temper.
With TW Jr as CEO, IBM saw exponential growth as a company for his whole term. And few companies could ever equal their growth in their sales, in their stock, and in the employee count. TW was a person who knew how to manage rapid growth — and his guiding hand touched virtually everything in the company. He broke down barriers in communications — and gave every employee a voice, and allowed staff to speak up against bad managers.
And, for TW Jr, the place to relax and think was on his boat or in the air. His times as a wartime pilot basically changed his world, especially in how business across nations can help reduce the opportunities for war. In fact, TW Jr. was a great advocate for thawing US/Russian relationships and was successful in achieving nuclear arms reductions between the two nations.
Over, a worthy life, and a great person and who created a great company. Some of his legacy lives on in IBM, and their continual focus on R&D is still a key factor for the company. But, they did disrupt their own market and have missed many emerging markets, especially with the rise of the Cloud. Their Watson computer, too, did not live up to its AI hype. But nothing can take away the contribution they have made to our world.
IBM’s greatest challenge?
As many companies have risen and fallen in each of the key eras of technology, IBM has sustained its lead. Who remembers that Plessey, Fairchild, RCA, Rockwell, Burroughs, DEC, and Sperry — all were leaders in technology at one time? In the 1970s, IBM was in the Top 5 companies in the world, and they sustained their Top 10 position until the end of the millennium. By 2020, the top companies in the world are now commonly tech companies (Amazon, Google, Facebook, AT&T and Intel) and where IBM slipped to 38th place in the Fortune 500, and is now down to 65th place in 2023:
IBM has managed to innovate around mainframes and then onto the PC, but now they know the future … the Cloud. For them, most other things … things related to services, software and systems running on-premise are now seen as a legacy. With the ever-increasing rise of the public cloud, IBM sees the threats of Amazon AWS and Microsoft Azure, as some of the most significant threats that it has ever seen to its core business … looking after its customers.
Personally, I see no other way but to move to the Cloud. Overall Sun Microsystems were right when they said, ‘The network is the computer’. Within the public cloud, there is a whole new toolbox for building dynamic systems and in a way that was never thought possible.
IBM will now split its company into two: IT infrastructure services unit (90,000 employees with over 4,000 clients across the world); and its main Cloud/AI unit. For IBM, their whole history has been to divest. Most recently they moved out of the PC, moved out of semiconductors, and then the low-level server market. The renewed focus on the Cloud builds on IBM’s $34 billion acquisition of Red Hat and shows the move towards cloud-based systems.
Will it work? Well, IBM is quite a way back from the leaders/visionaries of AWS, Microsoft, and Google, and even behind Oracle in building cloud infrastructures:
Conclusions
We take our modern world for granted. What we see in our iPhones is seven decades of continual innovation — all cramped into a small package. As a society, we have never advanced as fast as we have done in the last few decades — but where will all this advancement take us? Into a scary world of AI or a brave new world?
Thank you, IBM. Oh, and did you know that HAL is one letter away from IBM:
