Twenty-five years may not seem like a long time in other industries. However, the technology industry, and in particular the computer sector, has set a furious pace of innovation in the design of personal computers, software applications, and computer peripherals.
Founded in 1980, as Iomega marks its twenty-fifth year of continuous business in April 2005, it joins a select list of such pioneering computer and computer peripheral companies. These include IBM, founded 1924; Texas Instruments, 1930; Hewlett-Packard, 1938; Sony, 1956; Western Digital, 1970; Microsoft, 1975; Apple, 1976; and Seagate, 1979.
By 1982, an estimated 100 computer companies were producing personal computers; the vast majority have since merged or ceased operations. Just a few of the computer and computer peripherals-related companies less than 25 years old include Logitech, 1981; Adaptec, 1981; Maxtor, 1982; Adobe, 1982; Symantec, 1982; NDSI reincorporates as Novell, 1983; Dell, 1984; Gateway 1985; ATI, 1986; and Promise, 1988.
Computer Companies in Existence 25 years or more:
1. IBM
The Tabulating Machine Company becomes International Business Machines in 1924. Computing and storage milestones include Harvard`s IBM Mark 1 in 1944, a 5-ton behemoth and the first calculator controlled by a program using prepunched tape; the first magnetic tape storage device, the IBM 726 in 1952; the first computer disk storage system, the IBM 205 RAMAC in 1956, which holds 5 MB of data on 50 2-foot diameter disks; the IBM 3340 Winchester hard drive in 1974; and the IBM PC in 1981.
2. Texas Instruments
After beginning life in 1930 as Geophysical Service selling reflective seismographs, GSI becomes Texas Instruments in 1951. It launches the first commercial transistor in 1953 and invents the integrated circuit in 1958. It goes on to become one of the biggest chip producers of the computer revolution as well as one of the first microcomputers, the TI 99/4.
3. Hewlett-Packard
A Palo Alto garage, $538 in working capital, and a second-hand drill press get Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard started in 1938 with their first product: the 200A electronic audio oscillator to test sound equipment.
4. Sony
In 1956 Tokyo Telecommunications Laboratory changes its name to Sony and licenses Bell Lab`s transistor patents. Sony invents many storage standards including the 3.5 inch floppy drive in 1981, a standard feature in the first Apple Macintosh computer in 1984. It co-develops the CD audio format with Philips in 1983, and the two companies go on to introduce CD-ROM, the writable CD in 1990, and the CD-RW in 1997.
5. Western Digital
Western Digital was founded in 1970 and began designing and manufacturing hard drives in 1988.
6. Microsoft
The company was founded by two young Seattle men in 1975. The company moved to Redmond, Washington, with the vision of "a personal computer on every desk and in every home."
7. Apple
Apple Computer Company gets its start in 1976 when Stephen Jobs and Steven Wozniak release the Apple 1, but its successor, the Apple II, is the story in 1977. It has a built-in keyboard, an 8-slot motherboard, 4 KB RAM expandable to 48 KB, and colour graphics. Like other early PCs (the Radio Shack TRS-80, the Atari 2600, the Commodore PET), its weak link is storage, with only a cassette tape interface. Apple solves the storage problem in 1978 when Steve Wozniak creates the Apple Disk II floppy disk drive, vastly broadening the appeal of the Apple II by making storage convenient for ordinary users.
8. Seagate
When Alan Shugart founds Shugart Technology (later Seagate Technology) with Finis Conner in 1979, he has already made his mark in the storage industry by helping develop the IBM RAMAC disk storage technology in the 1950s. He goes on to invent the 8 inch floppy disk in 1971 and founds Shugart Associates in 1973, which introduces the first 5.25 inch floppy in 1976. Seagate Technology is today the world`s largest maker of hard disk drives.
9. Iomega
Iomega was founded in 1980 by four former IBM engineers who came up with a radical new approach to an old problem: how to keep the read/write heads of a magnetic storage device from crashing into its rotating platter and causing data loss. The crash-proof technology became the basis for the first Iomega signature product, the Bernoulli drive, creating the industry`s first high-capacity removable storage. Since then, Iomega has become a world leader in round magnetic storage, the basis for several signature products, including the Zip drive, which debuted in 1995, and the today`s new Iomega REV Drive, which utilises small 35GB removable disks for data storage, backup and archiving.
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