5/6/2023 0 Comments Computers at work 1990sThe scientists behind Deep Blue, however, preferred to stress more practical concerns. It was the first time a computer had beaten a top-ranked chess player in tournament play, and it ignited a public debate on how close computers could come to approximating human intelligence. ![]() In a six-game match in New York, Deep Blue defeated World Chess Champion Garry Kasparov. In May 1997, IBM dramatically demonstrated computing's potential with Deep Blue, a 32-node IBM RS/6000 SP computer programmed to play chess on a world class level. Services became the fastest growing segment of the company, with growth at more than 20 percent per year. That year, IBM acquired Lotus Development Corp., and the next year acquired Tivoli Systems Inc. In the fall of 1995, delivering the keynote address at the COMDEX computer industry trade show in Las Vegas, Gerstner articulated IBM's new vision - that network computing would drive the next phase of industry growth and would be the company's overarching strategy. Once again, customers were focused on integrated business solutions - a key IBM strength that combined the company's expertise in solutions, services, products and technologies. All the hard work IBM had done to catch up in the client/server field served the company well in the network computing era. With the rise of the Internet and network computing the company experienced another dramatic shift in the industry. Splitting the company would have destroyed a unique IBM advantage. He recognized that one of IBM's enduring strengths was its ability to provide integrated solutions for customers - someone to represent more than piece parts or components. Despite mounting pressure to split IBM into separate, independent companies, Gerstner decided to keep the company together. These steps included rebuilding IBM's product line, continuing to shrink the workforce and making significant cost reductions. Soon after he arrived, he had to take dramatic action to stabilize the company. Gerstner brought with him a customer-oriented sensibility and the strategic-thinking expertise that he had honed through years as a management consultant at McKinsey & Co. ![]() Gerstner had been chairman and CEO of RJR Nabisco for four years, and had previously spent 11 years as a top executive at American Express. For the first time in the company's history IBM had found a leader from outside its ranks. arrived as IBM's chairman and CEO on April 1, 1993. ![]() And IBM considered splitting its divisions into separate independent businesses. Cost management and streamlining became a chief concern. By 1993, the company's annual net losses reached a record $8 billion. The focus was on the desktop and personal productivity, not on business applications across the enterprise. Piece-part technologies took precedence over integrated solutions. Businesses' purchasing decisions were put in the hands of individuals and departments - not the places where IBM had long-standing customer relationships. And then, the client/server revolution sought to link all of those PCs (the "clients") with larger computers that labored in the background (the "servers" that served data and applications to client machines).īoth revolutions transformed the way customers viewed, used and bought technology. The PC revolution placed computers directly in the hands of millions of people. During the 1980s and early 1990s, IBM was thrown into turmoil by back-to-back revolutions.
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