“Business may not be the noblest pursuit, but it is true that men are bringing to it some of the qualities which actuate the explorer, scientist, artist: the zest, the open-mindedness, even the disinterestedness, with which the scientific investigator explores some field of research.”
—Earnest Elmo Calkins
8: The Computer in Business and Industry
The government, of course, is not the only user of the electronic computer. Business is faced with the same problems as government, plus others perhaps, and can use the same techniques in planning, producing, merchandising, and keeping track of its products. To General Electric goes the distinction of first installing the large-scale electronic computer for its business-data processing. This was done quite recently, in 1954. Commenting on the milestone, the Harvard Business Review said in part:
The revolution starts this summer at General Electric Company’s new Appliance Park near Louisville, Kentucky. The management planning behind the acquisition of the first UNIVAC to be used in business may eventually be recorded by historians as the foundation of the second industrial revolution; just as Jacquard’s automatic loom in 1801 or Frederick W. Taylor’s studies of the principles of scientific management a hundred years later marked turning points in business history.
It is early yet for comment from historians, but the growth of the business computers from the pioneer UNIVAC bears out the theme of the Harvard Business Review suggestion. In 1961 there were 6,000 large electronic computers in use; General Electric alone has more than 100. One big reason for this is the fact that government is not alone in its output of paperwork. It has been estimated that one-sixth of our Gross National Product, or about $85 billion, is devoted to paper-handling. In the time it takes to read this chapter, for example, Americans are writing 4 million checks, and this is only a small part of the paperwork involved in the banking business.
General Electric Co., Computer Dept.
First National Bank of Arizona personnel operate sorters during initial operation of a new GE-210 computer-controlled data-processing system. The sorters process bank checks at the rate of 750 per minute as printer (foreground) prints bank statements at 900 lines per minute.
Wholesale banks have been called fiscal intelligence agencies, doing business by the truckload, and measuring the morning mail by the ton. Yet this information is dealt with not only in volume, but in precise and accurate detail. If a client asks about the rating of a customer who has just ordered several million dollars worth of goods, the bank may be called on to furnish this information in a very short time, even though the customer resides halfway around the world.