Despite Best Intentions: The Evolution of the British Minicomputer Industry

Abstract

In the 1960s small computers emerged in the United States, based on the new semiconductor technology. Originally developed for use in industrial automation, they soon began to compete with the established mainframe computers. A number of British firms entered the new market, including diversified electronic goods manufacturers, enterpreneurial start-ups, and office machinery suppliers. The Wilson government saw small computers as a central element of industrial modernisation, and thus a part of its solution to Britian's economic decline. The Ministry of Technology was given twin objectives: to support industrial modernisation and to promote the British small computer manufacturers. However, US-built systems proved more competitive, and by the mid-1970s they had come to dominate the industry, with the few remaining British firms relegated to niche markets. The paper concludes that government involvement in the industry was well-guided, but ineffectual, and that organisational cultures were to a large extent responsible for the British companies' decline.