Chinese-American computer pioneer An Wang (1920-1990) and Wang Laboratories founded by him: some aspects of their history of interest to me - Part 1

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Last updated on 15th August 2021

Minor update on 28th May 2022

Part 2 of this post series can be read here:  https://ravisiyermisc.blogspot.com/2021/04/chinese-american-computer-pioneer-wang_19.html .

Part 3 (final part) of this post series can be read here:  https://ravisiyermisc.blogspot.com/2021/10/chinese-american-computer-pioneer-wang.html . 

 

Sections in this post

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Preamble

As this post is turning out to be a very long one, I decided to put up the work already done as Part-1. Later part/s will follow hopefully in the near future.

Before I get into the post proper I felt it appropriate to share some of my own tech. background related to Wang Laboratories (Wang Labs in short) and its Wang VS computer line. Wang VS computer line was the vital computer hardware & software platform in my formative years as a software developer (mid to late 1980s). 

If I recall correctly, I was told during one of my Indian company Datamatics' assignment stints in Wang Labs HQ in Lowell, Massachusetts, USA in second half of 1980s, that on one occasion, An Wang was in the same elevator (lift) that one of my Indian colleagues was in! I don't think I even saw Dr. An Wang, let alone have the privilege of sharing an elevator ride with him. And, to be frank, I was too young & immature to have a decent appreciation of the great pioneering and entrepreneurial computer industry work that An Wang had done. So An Wang was only Wang Labs founder-boss to me then even though that too was a very big thing. At that time, if I recall correctly, An Wang's son, Fred Wang, was President (boss) of Wang Labs. However, An Wang was very much a revered figure then in Wang Labs, even if people like me then did not know the full background for that reverence.

To know more about my Wang Labs exposure, please read my post: My Wang VS computers software development work including over 30 months of assignments at Wang US & Europe centres in 1980s, https://ravisiyermisc.blogspot.com/2021/03/my-wang-vs-computers-software.html .


Above pic: Wang Laboratories HQ in Lowell, Massachusetts, USA before it was bought by another company. This was how it looked during my assignment stints there. Pic courtesy: (cropped screenshot from) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZEvD7j-taE by Paul ...

[To open pic in larger resolution, right-click on pic followed by open link (NOT image) in new tab/window. In new tab/window you may have to click on pic to zoom in.]

Now in 2021, as I write about some I.T./computer software history related matters that I can relate to due to my own former technical background, I have a vastly higher understanding and respect for the pioneering achievements of An Wang. I am also grateful to him for creating Wang Labs and (indirectly) its Wang VS computer line, and (indirectly) for my assignments stints at Wang Labs HQ in USA as well as Wang ITRC in Belgium, which were vital in my formative years as a software developer. So I am very happy to write this post about some aspects of An Wang biography and of history of Wang Laboratories founded by him, that are of great interest to me, along with some comments from me about it. I view these posts (as it is now a multiple part/post article) as my gratitude offering to An Wang and the company he founded, Wang Laboratories.

An Wang's wiki page, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Wang , is interesting. But the IEEE Computers bio (referred to as 'IEEE bio' later in this post) is more detailed: https://history.computer.org/pioneers/wang.html . Note that the IEEE Computers bio states, "This material is drawn largely from Wang's 1986 didactic autobiography (Wang 1986)". This refers to the book Lessons by An Wang (with Eugene Linden),  https://books.google.co.in/books/about/Lessons.html?id=CSTxxSaJPGQC&redir_esc=y . 

I could not locate a PDF version of the book or an Indian printer-seller of the book. There are sellers on amazon.in who import used/new hardcover/paperback version of this book and where I pay in Indian Rupees, https://www.amazon.in/gp/product/0201094002 . After some thought, I placed an order on 31st March 2021 for a used hard cover copy priced around Rs.1230/- which is on the steep side for me, given my retired-from-commercial-work lower middle class Indian lifestyle. However, as Wang VS computers played such a vital role in establishing myself as an international software techie professional in my commercial work days, I felt it was worth paying that much to get a copy of An Wang's autobiography book. As the book probably has to be shipped from USA to India and go through Indian customs, the delivery time period is expected to be between 2 to 5 weeks.

[29th Jun. 2021 Update: I got the hardcover book in end April 2021. For more details please visit my post: Received "Lessons: An Autobiography" by An Wang with Eugene Linden used book from USA; Saw it is US public library discard; Legality of purchase of US library discarded books,  https://ravisiyermisc.blogspot.com/2021/06/received-lessons-autobiography-by-wang.html . end-Update]

[29th Jul. 2021 Update: Prior to reading the Lessons book and updating this post, I did some searching for some phrases in the Lessons book in Google Books and got lucky at times with being shown relevant snippets from the book. Of course, once I received the Lessons book and started reading it, I was having far better information than these snippets I had got earlier from Google Books. end-Update.]  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Laboratories provides information about Wang Laboratories, the company that An Wang founded.


1976 pic of An Wang with some of the computer models produced by Wang Labs. Pic courtesy:  https://www.computerhistory.org/revolution/minicomputers/11/364/1995 .


Cover page of Lessons book having An Wang picture. The book was first published in 1986 and so one can presume that the above pic is dated 1986 or a few years earlier. Pic courtesy:  https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4994155-lessons .
Note: This post heavily draws on the Lessons book. By default, "Wang writes" or "He writes" or similar words, in this post refers to what Wang has written in the Lessons book.

What follows are aspects of An Wang biography and history of Wang Labs that are of interest to me. These are NOT a substitute for An Wang's biography. 

I have also given some comments of mine which are indented and in italics. 

 

An Wang's early years in China (1920 to mid-1930s)

An Wang was born in Shanghai, China on 7th February 1920 (over a century ago). His father was a teacher of English besides practicing traditional Chinese medicine. His father started teaching him English when he was 4 years old.

His initial schooling was in a private elementary school where his father taught, in a city 30 miles away from Shanghai. This school did not have the first two grades, and so he started straight-away in the third grade. In later years of his education he found himself to be two years younger than his classmates, leading to some challenges but which he managed to overcome.

Wang was tutored in Confucianism by his grandmother. Wang refers to Confucianism as "the practical philosophy that has profoundly influenced Chinese character". He writes, "Ancient ideas such as Confucianism are as relevant today as they were twenty-five hundred years ago." Wang viewed the attributes or principles of moderation, patience, balance and simplicity as being important for success in business, and viewed them as being "Confucian in spirit". He believed that service to one's community gives satisfaction and viewed that too as "Confucian in spirit".

It is very interesting for me to note that Confucianism was key to An Wang's belief that service to community gives satisfaction. I don't know whether An Wang believed in God. That is a matter of great interest to me. Searching in Google Books page for the Lessons book, for God, god, religion, Christ and Christian words (5 separate searches on each word) yielded 0 results. [29th Jun. 2021 update: The index of the hardcover book also does not list the above words: God, god, ... ]

Chinese civil war and Japanese bombing of Shanghai impacted young An Wang's life! Shanghai was going through very troubled times in late 1920s itself as the communists and nationalists were fighting each other. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_massacre : "The Shanghai massacre of April 12, 1927, known commonly in China as the April 12 Purge or April 12 Incident, was the violent suppression of Communist Party of China (CPC) organizations in Shanghai by the military forces of Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek and conservative factions in the Kuomintang (Nationalist Party, or KMT)." An Wang would have been around 7 years old then. 

In 1931 Japan invaded Manchuria which later led to Japan attacking Shanghai. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/January_28_incident : "The January 28 incident or Shanghai incident (January 28 – March 3, 1932) was a conflict between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan. It took place in the Shanghai International Settlement which was under international control. Japanese army officers, defying higher authorities, had provoked anti-Japanese demonstrations in the international District of Shanghai following the Japanese invasion of Manchuria." .. "However, at midnight on January 28, Japanese carrier aircraft bombed Shanghai in the first major aircraft carrier action in East Asia. Barbara W. Tuchman described this as also being "the first terror bombing of a civilian population of an era that was to become familiar with it",[6] preceding the Condor Legion's bombing of Guernica by five years. Three thousand Japanese troops attacked targets, such as the Shanghai North railway station, around the city and began an invasion of the de facto Japanese settlement in Hongkew and other areas north of Suzhou Creek. In what was a surprising about-face for many, the 19th Route Army, which many had expected to leave after having been paid, put up fierce resistance. Also on the 28th, the Chinese Air Force dispatched nine planes to the Hongqiao Aerodrome, and the first aerial battle between Chinese and Japanese aircraft occurred on that day, although neither side suffered losses.[7]". [Wiki References: 6: Tuchman, Barbara (1970). Stilwell and the American experience of China. New York: Macmillan & Co. pp. Chapter 5;  7: https://www.thepaper.cn/newsDetail_forward_9024518 ]

An Wang would have been about 12 years old when Japan bombed Shanghai in early 1932. Wang writes in Lessons that a lot of propaganda was directed at school children by the politicians, and that between the ages of 8 and 12, he was forced to attend about five political rallies in a year. This resulted in An Wang having an aversion for political activism.

An Wang writes that the China of the 1920s and 1930s "was a China of feuding warlords and corruption, of Japanese brutality and fear." Wang writes that China's first attempt at democracy had failed [I think the reference is to 1912 founding of Republic of China and elections being held, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_in_China#Republic_of_China,_1912%E2%80%93present ].

Wang writes: "For the Chinese people, emerging from generations of decadent dynastic rule, the idea of democracy - that a person might choose his own leaders and that he might rise according to his energy and ability - was like the light that blinds the man emerging from a cave. People like Sun Yat-sen were so entranced by the nobility of their mission that they were easy prey for the warlords, who quickly saw the power vacuum created by the fall of the imperial government of the Manchu. The rivalries of the warlords produced famines in the countryside, and continual bloodshed in the cities."

As per Wang, the warlords were subdued around 1926 by Chiang Kai-Shek (leader of Koumintang or Nationalist party) with support from the communists. But Chiang Kai-Shek later, in 1927, turned against the communists, with many communists being killed in Shanghai.

This period is known as the "Age of Confusion". Wang writes: "For some educated Chinese, this period was like the European Renaissance, but for most of the poor, the times were more like the Dark Ages. Europeans read about the Dark Ages in textbooks as ancient history. The Age of Confusion is a living, terrible memory to those who suffered through it."

Wang mentions that when the Nationalists were targeting the communists, an uncle of his who had been a leftist was given shelter by his parents. He was kept hidden for six months till the danger had passed. Wang could not understand what wrong his uncle had done but could see his fear! [Ravi: Hmm. Wang would have been around 7 years old then and having seen an uncle living in such fear in his house would have been an unforgettable experience for the young boy.]


An Wang studying engineering in a Shanghai university and later getting involved in war between China and Japan, a part of World War II

At the age of 16, An Wang entered Chiao Tung University in Shanghai [now called Shanghai Jiao Tong University, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_Jiao_Tong_University ] studying "electrical engineering with an emphasis on communications" for the next 4 years. The subject was taught from American textbooks and was easy for An Wang.

However on the personal front there was lot of suffering. An Wang's mother died in 1936 during his first year at the university. An Wang writes about his mother's death in his book, Lessons, "While she had not been a victim of the street violence or Japanese bombings, she had been broken by years of fear and conflict. In short, she was a victim of the times."

After the Japanese invasion, the Chinese government moved the university to inside the French concession in Shanghai as that provided protection in the initial years of the war.

An Wang writes in Lessons, "Although those of us within the concession were relatively safe, we heard daily reports of these atrocities and could only imagine what was happening to our families. Abandoned by our own armies, we were powerless to do anything about the slaughter".

Wang's family made its way from Kun San to temporary safety in the concession.

Note that Japan's major conflict with China started in 1937 itself and continued on till end of World War II. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Sino-Japanese_War : "The Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) was a military conflict that was primarily waged between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan." .. "The beginning of the war is conventionally dated to the Marco Polo Bridge Incident 7 July 1937, when a dispute between Japanese and Chinese troops in Peking escalated into a full-scale invasion."

So while An Wang was studying electrical engineering in Chiao Tung University in Shanghai, full scale war had erupted between Japan and China, with Japan invading China! Note that the belligerents in the Chinese civil war had a truce for this period (1937-1945) as they jointly fought the Japanese invader (and eventually won).

After finishing his graduation in 1940, An Wang was a Teaching Assistant for a year at Chiao Tung university.

Wang writes, ".. it was becoming clear that the Japanese would soon control all of Shanghai. I also felt that it was time I made my contribution to the war effort. In the summer of 1941, about eight of my classmates and I signed on for the project that would best use our skills: designing and building transmitters and radios for the government troops for the Central Radio Corporation, an installation in the interior of China." Wang and his classmates did this through the university.

Wang's group went by boat from occupied Shanghai to still-British Hong Kong where they were instructed to go to Kweilin, deep in the mainland of China. To reach their destination, first the group went from Hong Kong to Kuan-chou-wan (also called Guangzhouwan, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guangzhouwan ), a French concession whose capital seems to have been Zhanjiang, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zhanjiang . Wang writes, "At this point, hundreds of miles from Shanghai, the Japanese lines were stretched thin. Our group infiltrated through the lines by cover of nightfall and marched for three days before we felt it was safe to travel openly". Then they took a riverboat and train to get to Nationalist-held Kweilin (now Guilin , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guilin ). Google Map tells us that today Zhanjiang to Guilin (Kweilin) by road is 609 kms (378 miles). The distance from Shanghai to Guilin when travelling directly on Chinese mainland is 1537 km (955 miles) , https://www.kimkim.com/ab/shanghai-to-guilin#map . An Wang and his group followed a circuitous route from Shanghai to Hong Kong to Guangzhouwan (Zhanjiang) (not under control of Japanese then), and then from Zhanjiang to Guilin on Chinese mainland where they had to cut across Japanese lines.

On arrival at Kweilin, 21-year-old Wang was made head of a group tasked with designing radio equipment for the war. Wang writes that the task had lot of responsibility and that his work "supported the military" but that he "was not really living a military life". Wang and group got a lot of practice in scavenging and improvisation when doing this work, which seems to have stood Wang in good stead in future years. Wang writes, "After my years of scavenging for parts in Kweilin, I automatically try to make efficient use of electrical components." Wang continues to say that even if components are available in plenty and at low cost, he believes that "the simplest solution to any engineering problem is the best solution".

The Japanese bombed Kweilin once or twice a week as they knew of the manufacturing work there that supported the Chinese army. Sentries would sound the alarm when the bombers were sighted. Wang and his team would drop what they were doing and rush to caverns in nearby mountains. These caverns were deep and so invulnerable to Japanese bombing. Over time, they got used to the bombing and noise during the bombing, and played cards to pass the time while in the caverns, with contract bridge being a favoured card game then.

Wang writes that this "routine of work and bombing" was over a period of around 3 years with the Japanese forces being just fifty to hundred miles away throughout this period.

In late 1944 Kweilin fell to the Japanese forces. Shortly before that, Wang and his group were moved to Chungking (now called Chongqing, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chongqing ) where Wang spent the last year of the war. 

Tragically, Wang's father and older sister Hsu died in the war though he seems to have come to know of it much later on. His younger sister and two younger brothers survived. Wang did not see them for 40 years!

Wang writes about the corruption of local Chinese generals and their oppression of the peasants that he saw in these years in China's interior. The people living in the area around Kweilin were poor peasants. These people were exploited by corrupt military and provincial officials "to the point of starvation"! In later years of the war, the armies lost their discipline resulting in more exploitation of the poor peasants. Advance payments of taxes were demanded from the poor peasants. To get supplies, generals would exaggerate their army personnel numbers. Peasants would be conscripted into the army but not fed and clothed properly. These peasants could not run away from the Chinese generals as the Japanese were closing in from all sides.

After the war with Japan got over, the civil war between the communists and nationalists in China resumed. Wang writes, "The demoralization that resulted from this corruption ultimately hurt the generals when they tried to rally the people against the Communists". So the local Chinese generals that Wang writes about in this section seem to have been Nationalist forces' generals and not communist generals. These Nationalist forces' generals lost popular support among the peasants due to their oppression and exploitation of the peasants during the war against Japan, and so when the Chinese civil war resumed after Japan had been defeated, the peasants did not back or support the Nationalist forces. Wang writes, "Even those peasants who were doubtful about Communism were not about to lift a finger to help their former oppressors (Nationalist generals)".

Hmm. So An Wang contributed with his engineering skills to Chinese Nationalist forces fighting Japan in World War II for around 3 years!  To join in the effort, he and 8 others in his group had to go through great risk and physical exertion (marching for 3 days) to slip through Japanese lines and safely reach Nationalist controlled city of Kweilin! I think that makes An Wang a World War II veteran or something close to it. I think it is tragic that An Wang's wiki page makes ***no mention*** of this significant work An Wang did for China in World War II.

Wang had lost his father, mother and elder sister in this period. He was now the eldest surviving member of his family and cut off from the other surviving siblings of his family.

An Wang's generation is close to my father's and uncles' generation. My father and his brothers and sister as well as my mother and her brother & sister were all raised in the South Indian state of Kerala and barring one uncle, eventually migrated to Bombay with almost all of the family in Bombay (Mumbai) around 1950s & 1960s. In comparison to An Wang's life in China (1920 to 1945), the lives of my parents and their siblings, seems to have been completely free of military conflict. A cousin of my father was a freedom fighter and went to jail in early 1940s but that was as part of a non-violent struggle against British rule. My father's younger brother studied marine engineering and as part of his study & work sailed to Britain but I think that may have been after World War II. Military conflict of World War II did not touch the state of Kerala or the city of Bombay as far as I know.

I think it would be fair to assume that this World War II stint of An Wang while in his early 20s, a short period after he had finished his engineering graduation, would have significantly enhanced An Wang's skills as a fighter and as a survivor, even if he did not participate directly in any military battles, and which would have contributed significantly to his future business entrepreneurial success.

While Wang was in Kweilin, he came to know of the Chinese Nationalist government program to send highly trained Chinese engineers to USA for apprenticeships in US industry after which they would return to China to help in reconstruction of China. Note that USA was a military ally of Chinese Nationalist government during World War 2 and gave significant military assistance to them. There was a competitive exam for applicants who wanted to be part of the program which Wang seems to have taken after he had been evacuated to Chungking. Wang was placed second in the exam. 

Wang writes that a few of his college friends from Chiao Tung university also qualified for the program. The several hundred who were chosen, were flown in groups by DC 3 "over the hump" which was the name given by Allied (US and other allies in WWII) pilots for the air route from India to China (and back) over the eastern part of the Himalayas. There were US/Allies military flights from India to China  as part of USA's material assistance to Chinese Nationalist government. These groups of young Chinese engineers were flown on the return flights to India. 


An Wang coming to USA and pursuing higher studies in applied physics (1945-48)

Wang and his group were flown to Ledo in Assam, India, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ledo,_Assam , from where they they took a train to Calcutta. They waited in Calcutta for around a month for the sea passage from Calcutta to USA to be arranged.

It is very interesting for me that An Wang entered India in April 1945 and stayed for a month in Calcutta (India) (now Kolkata, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kolkata ) and then went by sea to USA.

Wang writes, "I had seen a great deal of poverty and wartime deprivation in China, but things in Calcutta were even worse."

I think An Wang would have seen the effects of the Bengal famine of 1943 in Calcutta in April 1945. Some extracts from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bengal_famine_of_1943 are given below:

The Bengal famine of 1943 was a famine in the Bengal province of British India (now Bangladesh and eastern India) during World War II. An estimated 2.1–3 million,[A] out of a population of 60.3 million, died of starvation, malaria, and other diseases aggravated by malnutrition, population displacement, unsanitary conditions and lack of health care. Millions were impoverished as the crisis overwhelmed large segments of the economy and catastrophically disrupted the social fabric. Eventually, families disintegrated; men sold their small farms and left home to look for work or to join the British Indian Army, and women and children became homeless migrants, often travelling to Calcutta or other large cities in search of organised relief.[8] Historians usually characterise the famine as anthropogenic (man-made),[9] asserting that wartime colonial policies created and then exacerbated the crisis. A minority view exists, however, that holds that the famine was the result of natural causes.[10]

...

The financing of military escalation led to war-time inflation, as land was appropriated from thousands of peasants. Many workers received monetary wages rather than payment in kind with a portion of the harvest.[14] When prices rose sharply, their wages failed to follow suit; this drop in real wages left them less able to purchase food.[15] During the Japanese occupation of Burma, many rice imports were lost as the region's market supplies and transport systems were disrupted by British "denial policies" for rice and boats (a "scorched earth" response to the occupation). The Bengal Chamber of Commerce (composed mainly of British-owned firms),[16] with the approval of the Government of Bengal, devised a Foodstuffs Scheme to provide preferential distribution of goods and services to workers in high-priority roles such as armed forces, war industries, civil servants and other "priority classes", to prevent them from leaving their positions.[17] These factors were compounded by restricted access to grain: domestic sources were constrained by emergency inter-provincial trade barriers, while aid from Churchill's War Cabinet was limited, ostensibly due to a wartime shortage of shipping.[18] More proximate causes included large-scale natural disasters in south-western Bengal (a cyclone, tidal waves and flooding, and rice crop disease). The relative impact of each of these factors on the death toll is a matter of controversy.

The provincial government denied that a famine existed, and humanitarian aid was ineffective through the worst months of the crisis. The government first attempted to influence the price of rice paddy, but instead created a black market which encouraged sellers to withhold stocks, leading to hyperinflation from speculation and hoarding after controls were abandoned. Aid increased significantly when the British Indian Army took control of funding in October 1943, but effective relief arrived after a record rice harvest that December. Deaths from starvation declined, yet over half the famine-related deaths occurred in 1944, as a result of disease, after the food security crisis had abated.[19]

[Wiki References:]

8. Famine Inquiry Commission 1945a, p. 67; Greenough 1980, pp. 227–228.

9. A. Sen 1976; A. Sen 1981a; Ó Gráda 2015, p. 90.

10. Bowbrick 1986; Tauger 2003.

14. Greenough 1980, p. 212.

15. A. Sen 1981a, p. 75; Brennan 1988, p. 542; Brennan, Heathcote & Lucas 1984, p. 12.

16. Mukerjee 2010, p. 95.

17. Famine Inquiry Commission 1945a, p. 30, as cited in A. Sen 1981a, p. 56

18. J. Mukherjee 2015, pp. 141–142; Mukerjee 2010, pp. 191–218.

19. A. Sen 1977, p. 36; A. Sen 1981a, pp. 55, 215.

--- end Bengal famine wiki extracts ---

The sea voyage from Calcutta to Newport News, Virginia USA took about a month going through Indian Ocean, Red Sea, Suez Canal, Mediterranean Sea and then the Atlantic Ocean.

Wang writes that when he arrived in USA in June 1945, "the notion that there were things I could not or should not attempt to accomplish was utterly foreign to me." 

I think the above words of Wang showing the confidence he had in his capabilities are very significant. He was around 25 years old when he arrived in USA. My God! How much of the ups and downs of life had he already seen! This included great deal of suffering through loss of family members, contributing to Chinese war effort through his radio engineering skills, and having the satisfaction of seeing the Allies (including China) being close to winning the war against the Axis powers (including Japan) in World War II which meant complete Japanese retreat from any occupied Chinese territory.

In USA, Wang and his group were initially and temporarily housed in Georgetown University campus, Washington DC. While the program was for a 2 year technical apprenticeship, Wang thought of applying for higher (graduate) studies, after waiting for some time for a suitable apprenticeship position. Wang applied to Harvard and was accepted even though he was not carrying his past academic credentials records, starting in September 1945 as a graduate student in applied physics. Wang views himself as lucky in his timing for applying to Harvard as Japan was yet to surrender (Japan surrendered on Aug. 14th 1945 though formal surrender happened on 2nd Sept. 1945, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrender_of_Japan ) and so most young Americans were in the armed forces resulting in less competition for Harvard graduate studies positions/seats. In two semesters Wang satisfied the requirement for a master's degree in applied physics.

In 1946, as the Chinese civil war between nationalists and communists intensified, the nationalists govt. stopped the monthly $100 stipend to Wang. Now Wang had to get a job! He took up a clerical job with Chinese purchasing mission in Ottawa but that was not satisfactory. 

Wang applied to Harvard for admission to PhD program in applied physics. He was accepted and started his PhD in Feb. 1947. He was given a $1000 a year teaching fellowship followed later by another fellowship. That would have addressed his money issues. He chose a thesis topic in nonlinear mechanics which he felt he could complete quickly. He submitted his thesis in Feb. 1948 and obtained his degree formally in June 1948.


An Wang preferring to stay back in USA and not return to China as it became clear by mid-1947 that Chinese Nationalists were losing civil war to Chinese communists

Wang writes in Lessons that while he was doing his PhD, the situation in China was of great concern to him and fellow Chinese students who, during and after dinner late into the night, would be discussing the state of the civil war in China. The US newspapers like New York Times covered Nationalist triumphs mostly but Wang suspected such reports to be biased. From fellow students who got mail from China, Wang learned that the Chinese communists were winning the civil war.

In his group of Chinese friends, there was a large group supporting Nationalists and a very small group supporting communists. Some said they would not return to China if Communists won, some said they would not return if Nationalists won and a large number of people were apolitical and in between these two groups. Wang writes that he was in the apolitical group and hoped for a coalition government (between Nationalists and Communists).

By mid-1947 it became clear to Wang that the Nationalists were going to be defeated. There were reports of massacres in China. Wang's parents had passed away and his younger sister and brothers were being taken care of by other family members, and so Wang writes, "there was little for me to return to". Wang also felt that he had been an independent person for long and so "could not thrive under a totalitarian Communist system". Wang began to consider not returning to China and staying back in USA.

Wang writes that his classmate T.L. Wu who had come first in the examination held by the Chinese Nationalist government to select persons for the USA program (where Wang himself had come second), returned to China after his USA stint. Tragically, "he was persecuted and died during the Cultural Revolution".

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_Revolution : "The Cultural Revolution, formally the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a violent sociopolitical purge movement in China from 1966 until 1976. Launched by Mao Zedong, Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and founder of the People's Republic of China (PRC), its stated goal was to preserve Chinese communism by purging remnants of capitalist and traditional elements from Chinese society, and to re-impose Mao Zedong Thought (known outside China as Maoism) as the dominant ideology in the PRC. The Revolution marked Mao's return to the central position of power in China after a period of less radical leadership to recover from the failures of the Great Leap Forward, which contributed to the Great Chinese Famine only five years prior." As per this wiki page, the estimated death toll of the Cultural Revolution is between hundreds of thousands and twenty million!

One can't but wonder what may have happened if An Wang had returned to China after his planned USA stint (of around 2 years), like T.L. Wu. Perhaps An Wang may have then met the same tragic fate of Wu or even if he managed to survive the Cultural Revolution and rise to some powerful position in Communist China, he surely would not have been able to rise to the great heights of entrepreneurial success as well as inventions in digital electronics and computer field that he achieved by staying back in USA.

Wang thinks that half of the around fifty Chinese students in Cambridge area (of Mass., USA) returned to China. When Wang visited China around three and a half decades later (perhaps around 1982), he came to know from his former fellow graduate students that a few rose to high positions in the Communist government but that more than one had died in the 1960s purges of the Cultural Revolution.


An Wang's research work in Harvard Computation Laboratory and his core memory related invention and patent application (1948-49) 

Wang applied to Harvard Computation Laboratory for a job. Howard Aiken of Harvard Computation Laboratory was working on (Harvard) Mark IV computer for the US Air Force. Aiken and Benjamin Moore interviewed Wang after which Wang was given the 'research fellow' job. Wang writes that he applied to Harvard Computation Laboratory because it was nearby and he thought he had the ability to do the work, but not due to any eagerness to work on computers. Wang's graduate studies did not involve computers but he had studied digital electronic circuits and that, along with his PhD degree, seems to have landed him the job.

https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/wang states, "Wang was introduced by E. Leon Chaffee (1885–1975), who supervised his doctoral thesis at Harvard, to Howard Aiken (1900–1973) .." Note that Aiken's doctoral thesis was also supervised by Chaffee as per https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_H._Aiken . Lessons book also states that Prof.  E. Leon Chaffee was the "faculty advisor" for Wang's (PhD) dissertation. Thus Wang having the same PhD supervisor as Aiken, and Wang being introduced by this common PhD supervisor, may have made it easier for Wang to land the job with Aiken (at Harvard Computation Laboratory).

In May 1948, Aiken gave Wang a problem about recording and reading magnetically stored data. The problem was that the act of reading the magnetically recorded data resulted in the related area being demagnetized and so the data got lost. Wang got the solution of immediately after reading, writing it back on the magnetic core.

Implementing that design in the Harvard Mark IV computer required lot of effort to procure the right materials. IEEE bio states, "To put the toroids into a memory system, he (An Wang) linked them in series so they became the magnetic core delay line used in the Mark IV, but in almost no other computer."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvard_Mark_IV states "The Harvard Mark IV was an electronic stored-program computer built by Harvard University under the supervision of Howard Aiken for the United States Air Force. The computer was finished being built in 1952.[1: Research, United States Office of Naval (1953). A survey of automatic digital computers. Office of Naval Research, Dept. of the Navy. p. 43.] It stayed at Harvard, where the Air Force used it extensively.

The Mark IV was all electronic. The Mark IV used magnetic drum and had 200 registers of ferrite magnetic core memory (one of the first computers to do so)." The "200 registers of ferrite magnetic core memory" part seems to be what An Wang invented & implemented.

Some relevant extracts from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetic-core_memory are given below:

Magnetic-core memory was the predominant form of random-access computer memory for 20 years between about 1955 and 1975. Such memory is often just called core memory, or, informally, core.

Core memory uses toroids (rings) of a hard magnetic material (usually a semi-hard ferrite) as transformer cores, where each wire threaded through the core serves as a transformer winding. Three or four wires pass through each core. Magnetic hysteresis allows each of the cores to "remember", or store a state.

Each core stores one bit of information. A core can be magnetized in either the clockwise or counter-clockwise direction. The value of the bit stored in a core is zero or one according to the direction of that core's magnetization. Electric current pulses in some of the wires through a core allow the direction of the magnetization in that core to be set in either direction, thus storing a one or a zero. Another wire through each core, the sense wire, is used to detect whether the core changed state.

The process of reading the core causes the core to be reset to a zero, thus erasing it. This is called destructive readout. When not being read or written, the cores maintain the last value they had, even if the power is turned off. Therefore they are a type of non-volatile memory.

...

Frederick Viehe applied for various patents on the use of transformers for building digital logic circuits in place of relay logic beginning in 1947. A fully developed core system was patented in 1947, and later purchased by IBM in 1956.[3] This development was little-known, however, and the mainstream development of core is normally associated with three independent teams.

Substantial work in the field was carried out by the Shanghai-born American physicists An Wang and Way-Dong Woo, who created the pulse transfer controlling device in 1949.[4][5] The name referred to the way that the magnetic field of the cores could be used to control the switching of current; his patent focused on using cores to create delay-line or shift-register memory systems. Wang and Woo were working at Harvard University's Computation Laboratory at the time, and the university was not interested in promoting inventions created in their labs. Wang was able to patent the system on his own.

...

Two key inventions led to the development of magnetic core memory in 1951. The first, An Wang's, was the write-after-read cycle, which solved the problem of how to use a storage medium in which the act of reading erased the data read, enabling the construction of a serial, one-dimensional shift register (of 50 bits), using two cores to store a bit. A Wang core shift register is in the Revolution exhibit at the Computer History Museum. The second, Forrester's, was the coincident-current system, which enabled a small number of wires to control a large number of cores enabling 3D memory arrays of several million bits. The first use of core was in the Whirlwind computer, and Project Whirlwind's "most famous contribution was the random-access, magnetic core storage feature."[13] 

[Wiki References:]

3. Reilly, Edwin D. (2003). Milestones in computer science and information technology. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. p. 164. ISBN 1-57356-521-0.

4. "Wang Interview, An Wang's Early Work in Core Memories". Datamation. US: Technical Publishing Company: 161–163. March 1976.

5. US 2708722, Wang, An, "Pulse Transfer Controlling Device", https://worldwide.espacenet.com/patent/search/family/022404657/publication/US2708722A?q=pn%3DUS2708722 .

13.  Redmond, Kent C.; Smith, Thomas M. (1980). Project Whirlwind - The History of a Pioneer Computer. Bedford, Mass.: Digital Press. p. 215. ISBN 0932376096.

--- end extracts from Magnetic-core memory wiki page ---

Note that Project Whirlwind, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whirlwind_I , was an MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) project.

In Lessons book, An Wang mentions Dr. Way Dong Woo as a fellow graduate of Chiao Tung University who was his colleague at the Harvard Computation Laboratory. But Wang does not mention Dr. Way Dong Woo's contribution to the magnetic core memory related "pulse transfer controlling device"! Instead Wang gives the impression that he was the sole inventor of the device even though he uses the word 'we' without naming anybody else, in the context of searching for the best magnetic material to make the cores in the device! Perhaps Dr. Way Dong Woo contributed in this work and so An Wang uses the word 'we'. For the rest of the work involved in coceptualizing and then fabricating the device, Wang gives the impression, in Lessons book, that it was his own work without assistance from others. But Wang writes, "In June of 1949, Way Dong Woo and I had presented a paper on magnetic memory storage at a meeting of the American Physics Society which received a good deal of attention." The question that props up is whether the joint paper covers the magnetic core memory invention that Wang had worked on and if so, whether it conveys the impression that that invention was a joint invention by Wang and Woo. In this context, it has to be noted that when Wang got his patent for this invention in 1955 where he claimed it was his sole work, during the one year period when the patent could be challenged, Dr. Way Dong Woo did not challenge it.

In June 1949 Wang considered applying for a patent for his invention, and was encouraged by his wife to do so. Wang writes that he had heard about other engineers getting patents for their ideas but that he did not know of any one at Harvard Computation Laboratory who had applied for a patent. Wang consulted with Harvard administration who advised him to apply for it at his own expense and recommended using the same patent attorney's firm that they used.

Wang writes that his decision to file a patent was somewhat shocking to his colleagues at the Laboratory. They felt that Dr. Aiken would be upset with this decision. Note that Wang had not discussed applying for a patent with Dr. Aiken but instead consulted with Harvard Administration. as Wang had "heard enough about Aiken" to know that he may not provide an encouraging response. Wang writes, " .. knowing his (Aiken's) conviction that computer developments should be kept in the public domain, or dedicated to the public, they (Wang's colleagues) felt that it was crazy for me to seek a patent for my work on memory cores".

On 21st Oct. 1949, Wang filed for a patent titled "Pulse Transfer Controlling Devices" with 34 claims, at his own expense using the same patent attorney's firm used by Harvard. That patent was eventually issued on 17th May 1955. 

Wang writes that after filing the patent, he braced himself for a meeting with Dr. Aiken where he would inform him of his action. In the meeting, Dr. Aiken did not react negatively nor did he have a positive reaction - he had no reaction, to this news. 

Ravi: Perhaps Dr. Aiken was informed by Harvard administration whom Wang had consulted, about Wang's interest in applying for a patent, and so was not surprised by Wang telling him that he had filed for a patent.

Wang was later given a raise in his job at the Laboratory and Wang did not feel any noticeable difference in Aiken's relations with him after this meeting, for the next one and a half years Wang spent at the Laboratory.

One of the patent's claims, number 24, resulted in the patent owner having rights to royalties from all who made core memories, for the lifetime of the patent which was 17 years - till 1972. But the US government did not have to pay royalty as they had funded the work at Harvard where Wang came up with his invention.

Wang also wrote "a couple of other papers for scholarly journals" on his invention which aroused interest of others in the field.


An Wang founding Wang Laboratories as "sole proprietorship" (1951) and its initial years

In 1950 Wang noted that Harvard university was going to de-emphasize basic computer research as per its policy of keeping out of fields with commercial applications.

Wang writes in Lessons that after his patent filing, he was repeatedly contacted by researchers working on computer development, from industry as well as academia. His published papers on memory cores also contributed to him being viewed as "an expert in digital electronics". Given this reputation, Wang thought he should start his own business in area of making and selling memory cores where capital needs were not high, and that he could possibly get contracts for projects in digital electronics.

Wang started reading books on running a business and asked people about running businesses in Massachusetts. Meanwhile Wang had got married in 1949 to a Chinese lady who had also come to USA for further studies, and whose family had some USA ties. Their first child Fred Wang was born in September 1950. Wang discussed the business idea with his wife but his wife was quite immersed in post-birth complications of their baby, and so did not realize the significance of Wang considering quitting his job and starting a business, until later.

Wang quit Harvard Computation Laboratory and in June 1951 he founded Wang Laboratories as a "sole proprietorship" as that was easy to do and involved only a little expense.  His office, a rented one, was on Columbus Avenue in the South End of Boston.

Wang writes, "I used my own name in part because at that point my expectations were that I would be the company since it was a sole proprietorship, and perhaps in part out of pride. I wanted the company to reflect my values and my origins - and in truth I could not think of a better name." 

About the 'Laboratories' part of the company name, Wang writes that him working at Harvard Computation Laboratory, led him to think of using Laboratories in the name. He writes, ".. while the two laboratories would be very different in scale, I would be doing work at my laboratory that was similar to the work I had done at the Computation Laboratory. I used the plural, laboratories, rather than the singular because I thought the company would expand over the years, and I wanted a name that accommodated growth". 

It is great to know the origin of Laboratories part of Wang Laboratories company name as most computer companies of 1980s when I worked on Wang computers, like Digital Equipment Corporation or International Business Machines, did not have the word Laboratories in their names! 

Wang writes that he was "very naive" as he did not think of marketing studies, reaction of investment community etc. when deciding the company name.

Wang writes that he felt intense pride about Chinese culture and that Confucianism was relevant in current times too. Wang writes, "There is also a practical genius to Chinese culture that allows it to assimilate new ideas without destroying old ones." He goes on to say that he, a Chinese himself, had mastered some areas of scientific discipline which were strengths of Western culture.

Wang also writes that he was "distressed to see the menial role Americans assigned to Chinese back then, and a small part of the reason I founded Wang Laboratories was to show that Chinese could excel at things other than running laundries and restaurants." 

Wang's capital was the 600 dollars in savings he had. He had no orders or contracts and neither had any office furniture.

Wang had been making $5,400 a year, and hoped to make around $8,000 in his first year on his own.

Hmm. Wang arrived in USA in 1945 as an engineering graduate who wanted to pursue higher studies. Just 6 years later in 1951, he had a PhD in applied physics, was noted for his work on magnetic core memory, and had started his own company - Wang Laboratories!

Wang's Chinese friends who were sensitive to anti-Asian discrimination questioned the wisdom of opening a business in this hi-tech area which was viewed as "the province of the establishment". Wang writes that while he was aware of some discrimination against the Chinese in USA, he and his wife were insulated from such discrimination in the cosmopolitan Cambridge (Massachusetts) community they lived in.

I think it must have been really unusual to have a Chinese man (Wang became a US citizen later on) start a business in a hi-tech area in the USA in 1951! Hats off to An Wang for his courage and determination to discard concerns about anti-Asian discrimination and plunge into business in USA at that time.

Wang writes in Lessons, (the year is 1951) "On June 22, I received the papers which certified that I, Dr. An Wang, would be doing business as Wang Laboratories." June 30th 1951 seems to have been the first working day of Wang Laboratories as Wang writes that on that day, ".. I entered the bare, unfurnished space of about two hundred square feet that was to be the business headquarters of Wang Laboratories."  The rented office cost him 70 dollars per month. He purchased a table and a chair, and organized a telephone connection. With that, Wang got down to business!

Wang contacted everybody in universities, industry and government who he thought may want to buy memory cores, which he was offering at $4 each. I think his experience as a leader of the group making radio equipment for the Chinese nationalists in World War 2, would have given the confidence that he could make such memory cores on his own and sell them. I mean, his World War 2 experience seems to have been that of a kind of small scale manufacturing (assembling from whatever components he & his team could find) of radio equipment. Now he had to manufacture memory cores, and he had the technical know how for it. What would have been new to Wang was marketing it and earning money from sales which would keep his company going. In 3 weeks from the time he started his business, he got some responses and orders. Wang writes, "At first, it would be a big day if an order came in for four memory cores."

For making the memory cores, Wang was able to get the raw materials easily using contacts he had made while at Harvard Computation Laboratory. He needed only a soldering iron to make memory cores from the raw materials. Note that one memory core stored only one bit of information and Wang sold it at $4. 

Wang also went through government Request for Proposals (RFPs) to see if there were any projects that he could bid for.

Very interestingly, Wang thought of useful applications of digital electronics that he could invent. Wang writes about his first invention project (not a customer project but Wang's own invention project), "The first project had to do with digital counting devices which could record, store, and display data. At that time, there were really no electrical devices apart from computers that could store and retrieve data, so I figured that I could use my magnetic cores in a number of useful applications."

The sale price of this first digital counting device Wang invented was $4 for small volume and lower prices for larger volume!

Wang hired his first employee, Bob Gallo, who was studying advertising art at Boston University, and who helped in assembly of cores and also managed the office when Wang was away. Wang also got Gallo to design the company logo, which was used for almost twenty years.

Very interestingly, Wang writes about the differences between his business approach and that of J. Presper Eckert and John Mauchly who founded a computer company in 1946, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eckert%E2%80%93Mauchly_Computer_Corporation (which, after many company sales & mergers, today in 2021 survives as Unisys, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unisys ), and Ken Olsen  and Harlan Anderson who founded computer company, DEC,  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Equipment_Corporation ,  in 1957. Eckhart and Mauchly had worked on building the ENIAC computer, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ENIAC , which was completed in 1945, at the University of Pennsylvania. They founded their own company in 1946 but perhaps due to the high R&D costs involved in making a computer then, Eckhart and Mauchly had to eventually sell their company to Remington Rand in 1950. About DEC, Wang writes that Olsen got outside financing so that DEC could build a minicomputer. In contrast, Wang writes that he had no ambitions to make computers as he would not have been able to raise the large amount of money needed for such projects, and even if he was able to raise such money, he did not want to have the burden of such debt (if outside financing was used) or having to justify his work to investors (if the money came through investors). So Wang explored only those applications/inventions in digital information processing that his small company could handle from a resources point of view.

Wang writes that the first time he demonstrated his inventions at a trade show was in December 1951 at an Institute for Radio Engineering (IRE) exhibition and conference in New York City. Wang along with his first employee (and perhaps only employee then) Bob Gallo drove down to New York City for the exhibition with Wang's memory cores and various digital devices that he had developed. The Wang booth (just a table) at the exhibition saw a lot of visitors and that curiosity and interest in Wang's devices (products) resulted in a spurt of orders.

I was very interested to read about the above as it seems to be a significant milestone in An Wang's journey in the commercial products world where demonstrating one's products in trade/industry shows cements one's brand identity in the industry. Industry is very different from academic research world. In academic & scientific research, Wang could establish himself through research publications and presentations of his research to fellow scientists. In the industry world, one has to market (with trade shows being a very important marketing channel/mechanism), get orders and then deliver working products to customers. An Wang had achieved the milestone of a successful trade show participation which resulted in a spurt of orders, when Wang Laboratories seems to have been just a 2 person company - Wang and Gallo, and in around the first six months of the company's existence.

To strengthen his financial position, Wang taught an electrical engineering evening course at Northeastern University (seems to be this private university in Boston: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northeastern_University ), earning 12 dollars per lecture. As his company's sales of memory cores picked up, he hired a co-op student (who divide time between work and study) of Northeastern, to work part-time for his company, helping in making memory cores.

He got contracts to design/develop specialized digital equipment. The first such contract was in the fall of 1952 from a Cambridge company to "develop a pulse synchronizer and counting device", with the contract giving Wang 300 dollars a week and which was "the first steady stream of income" since the company's founding. More contracts related to specialized digital equipment followed, with many of the related projects being sub-contracted work for government funded projects (grants).

Wang writes, "While working on consulting projects, I developed a facility with digital electronics that served me well as the company began to develop more ambitious technologies. Although I was very concerned with maintaining cash flow, this time served as an incubation period during which I leaned about both the marketplace of digital electronics and the essentials of running a business." Wang focused on technological innovation that "served the needs of the marketplace", this approach continued in later decades of the company.

Wang writes that in these early years of Wang Laboratories company, he made some mistakes but they were small mistakes which did not threaten the future of the company.

Before we cover Wang's discussions with IBM on licensing his memory core patent, I think it is appropriate to give some background of IBM and commercial computer field at that time.

The first commercially available general-purpose digital computer in the world - Ferranti Mark 1 - was made in UK and delivered in UK in February 1951. Given below are extracts from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferranti_Mark_1 :

The Ferranti Mark 1, also known as the Manchester Electronic Computer in its sales literature,[1] and thus sometimes called the Manchester Ferranti, was produced by British electrical engineering firm Ferranti Ltd. It was the world's first commercially available general-purpose digital computer.[a]

..

The first machine was delivered to the Victoria University of Manchester in February 1951[3] (publicly demonstrated in July)[4][5] ahead of the UNIVAC I, which was sold to the United States Census Bureau on 31 March 1951, although not delivered until late December the following year.[6]

[Notes and References:]

Notes:

a. A wide variety of general purpose computers were available by 1951. See Pentagon symposium: Commercially Available General Purpose Electronic Digital Computers of Moderate Price, Washington, D.C., 14 MAY 1952

References:
1. Lavington, Simon (1998), A History of Manchester Computers (2 ed.), The British Computer Society, ISBN 978-1-902505-01-5 , p. 25

3. Teuscher, Christof (2004), Alan Turing: Life and Legacy of a Great Thinker, Springer Science & Business Media, pp. 334–335, ISBN 9783540200208

4,  Cooper, S. Barry; Leeuwen, J. van (18 March 2013). Alan Turing: His Work and Impact. Elsevier. p. 468. ISBN 9780123870124.

5.

  •  "10. The Ferranti Computer at Manchester University, England". Digital Computer Newsletter. 3 (3): 4–5. October 1951.
  • "11. The Ferranti Computer at Manchester University, England". Digital Computer Newsletter. 4 (3): 6. July 1952.

6.  UNIVAC I#cite ref-8 , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UNIVAC_I#cite_ref-8

--- end Ferranti Mark 1 wiki extracts ---

Given below are some extracts from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UNIVAC_I :

The UNIVAC I (UNIVersal Automatic Computer I) was the first general-purpose electronic digital computer design for business application produced in the United States.[1] It was designed principally by J. Presper Eckert and John Mauchly, the inventors of the ENIAC. Design work was started by their company, Eckert–Mauchly Computer Corporation (EMCC), and was completed after the company had been acquired by Remington Rand (which later became part of Sperry, now Unisys). In the years before successor models of the UNIVAC I appeared, the machine was simply known as "the UNIVAC".[2]

The first Univac was accepted by the United States Census Bureau on March 31, 1951, and was dedicated on June 14 that year.[3][4] The fifth machine (built for the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission) was used by CBS to predict the result of the 1952 presidential election. With a sample of a mere 5.5% of the voter turnout, it famously predicted an Eisenhower landslide.[5]

[References:]

1. The first commercial computer in the world was the BINAC built by the Eckert–Mauchly Computer Corporation and delivered to Northrop Aircraft Company in 1951.

2. Johnson, L.R., "Coming to grips with Univac," IEEE Annals of the History of Computing , vol.28, no.2, pp.32,42, April–June 2006. doi: 10.1109/MAHC.2006.27

3. Reference: CNN's feature on the 50th anniversary of the UNIVAC.

4. Norberg, Arthur Lawrence (2005). Computers and Commerce: A Study of Technology and Management at Eckert-Mauchly Computer Company, Engineering Research Associates, and Remington Rand, 1946-1957. MIT Press. pp. 190, 217. ISBN 9780262140904.

5. Lukoff, Herman (1979). From Dits to Bits: A personal history of the electronic computer. Portland, Oregon, USA: Robotics Press. pp. 127–131. ISBN 0-89661-002-0. LCCN 79-90567.

--- end wiki extracts ---

https://time.com/4271506/census-bureau-computer-history/ shows a 1951 pic of the UNIVAC at Philadelphia, USA and gives some info. about U.S. Census Bureau's evaluation and then usage of UNIVAC computer.

IBM collaborated with USA research institutions on computers but was behind UNIVAC in commercially available "general-purpose electronic digital computer design(ed) for business application(s)"! But a short while after IBM got into the field, it dominated the market. First here is some info. about IBM's collaboration with USA research institutions in 1940s and early 1950s. Given below are extracts from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_IBM :

1944: ASCC. IBM introduces the world's first large-scale calculating computer, the Automatic Sequence Control Calculator (ASCC). Designed in collaboration with Harvard University, the ASCC, also known as the Mark I, uses electromechanical relays to solve addition problems in less than a second, multiplication in six seconds, and division in 12 seconds.[97]

...

Despite introducing its first computer a year after Remington Rand's UNIVAC in 1951, within five years IBM had 85% of the market. A UNIVAC executive complained that "It doesn't do much good to build a better mousetrap if the other guy selling mousetraps has five times as many salesmen".[34]

...

Watson Jr. also continued to partner with the United States government to drive computational innovation. The emergence of the Cold War accelerated the government's growing awareness of the significance of digital computing and drove major Department of Defense supported computer development projects in the 1950s. Of these, none was more important than the SAGE interceptor early detection air defense system.

In 1952, IBM began working with MIT's Lincoln Laboratory to finalize the design of an air defense computer. The merger of academic and business engineering cultures proved troublesome, but the two organizations finally hammered out a design by the summer of 1953, and IBM was awarded the contract to build two prototypes in September.[104] In 1954, IBM was named as the primary computer hardware contractor for developing SAGE for the United States Air Force. Working on this massive computing and communications system, IBM gained access to pioneering research being done at Massachusetts Institute of Technology on the first real-time, digital computer. This included working on many other computer technology advancements such as magnetic core memory, a large real-time operating system, an integrated video display, light guns, the first effective algebraic computer language, analog-to-digital and digital-to-analog conversion techniques, digital data transmission over telephone lines, duplexing, multiprocessing, and geographically distributed networks. IBM built fifty-six SAGE computers at the price of US$30 million each, and at the peak of the project devoted more than 7,000 employees (20% of its then workforce) to the project. SAGE had the largest computer footprint ever and continued in service until 1984.[105]

More valuable to IBM in the long run than the profits from governmental projects, however, was the access to cutting-edge research into digital computers being done under military auspices. IBM neglected, however, to gain an even more dominant role in the nascent industry by allowing the RAND Corporation to take over the job of programming the new computers, because, according to one project participant, Robert P. Crago, "we couldn't imagine where we could absorb two thousand programmers at IBM when this job would be over someday, which shows how well we were understanding the future at that time."[106] IBM would use its experience designing massive, integrated real-time networks with SAGE to design its SABRE airline reservation system, which met with much success.

These government partnerships, combined with pioneering computer technology research and a series of commercially successful products (IBM's 700 series of computer systems, the IBM 650, the IBM 305 RAMAC (with disk drive memory), and the IBM 1401) enabled IBM to emerge from the 1950s as the world's leading technology firm.  Watson Jr. had answered his self-doubt. In the five years since the passing of Watson Sr. [Ravi: passed away in June 1956], IBM was two and a half times bigger, its stock had quintupled, and of the 6000 computers in operation in the United States, more than 4000 were IBM machines.[107]

[References:]

34. Greenwald, John (July 11, 1983). "The Colossus That Works". TIME. Archived from the original on May 14, 2008. Retrieved May 18, 2019.

97. Pugh (1995) pp.72–76

104. Pugh (1995) p.210

105. Pugh (1995) p.216ff

106. Wendover, Robert (2003). High Performance Hiring. Thomson Crisp Learning. p. 179. ISBN 1-56052-666-1.

107. Watson, Jr. (1990) p.342

--- end History of IBM wiki extracts ---

Now about what seems to be the first commercially available IBM mainframe computer and computer models later produced in this series, that seems to have paved the way for IBM becoming the dominant mainframe company in USA and the world, for many decades afterwards. Given below are extracts from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_701 :

The IBM 701 Electronic Data Processing Machine, known as the Defense Calculator while in development, was IBM’s first commercial scientific computer and its first series production mainframe computer, which was announced to the public on April 29, 1952.[1] It was invented and developed by Jerrier Haddad and Nathaniel Rochester based on the IAS machine at Princeton.[2][3][4]

The IBM 701 was the first computer in the IBM 700/7000 series, which was responsible for bringing electronic computing to the world and for IBM's dominance in the mainframe computer market during the 1960s and 1970s that continues today.[5] The series were IBM’s high-end computers until the arrival of the IBM System/360 in 1964.[5]

The business-oriented sibling of the 701 was the IBM 702 and a lower-cost general-purpose sibling was the famous IBM 650, which became the first mass produced computer in the world.[4][6]

[References:]

1. "IBM 701 Electronic analytical control unit". IBM. Retrieved 19 December 2020.

2. Electronic data processing machine Patent US3197624A filed in 1954, granted in 1965, Jerrier Haddad, Richard K Richards,Rochester Nathaniel ,Jr Harold D Ross

3. Turing's Cathedral, by George Dyson, 2012, ISBN 978-1-4000-7599-7, p. 267-68, 287

4. Pichler, Franz. Computer Aided Systems Theory. p. 60.

5. "The IBM 700 Series: Computing Comes to Business". IBM.com.  https://www.ibm.com/ibm/history/ibm100/us/en/icons/ibm700series/transform/

6. "The IBM 650 Magnetic Drum Calculator". Columbia.edu.

--- end IBM_701 wiki extracts ---

From https://www.ibm.com/ibm/history/ibm100/us/en/icons/ibm700series/transform/ : "The IBM ® 701 was a landmark product for the company and the world. It was IBM’s first commercially available scientific computer, and its first large-scale electronic computer manufactured in quantity. Previously, the company’s large-scale systems were designed for use by specific companies or organizations, and manufactured individually.

Developed and produced in record time—less than two years from “first pencil on paper” to installation—the IBM 701 was the first of the pioneering line of IBM 700 series computers that would revitalize the company and bring electronic computing to the world. IBM initially had ten confirmed orders for the IBM 701 in May 1952, and ended up manufacturing and installing a total of nineteen units from 1952 through 1955."


IBM uses "no-holds-barred style of competition" to drive down price of Wang's memory core patent from Wang's ask of $2.5 million in 1955 to $400,000 sale in 1956; Harvard does not challenge Wang's patent as joint work or public domain work

It is appropriate to repeat a wiki page extract from earlier on in this post. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetic-core_memory :

Two key inventions led to the development of magnetic core memory in 1951. The first, An Wang's, was the write-after-read cycle, which solved the problem of how to use a storage medium in which the act of reading erased the data read, enabling the construction of a serial, one-dimensional shift register (of 50 bits), using two cores to store a bit. A Wang core shift register is in the Revolution exhibit at the Computer History Museum. The second, Forrester's, was the coincident-current system, which enabled a small number of wires to control a large number of cores enabling 3D memory arrays of several million bits. The first use of core was in the Whirlwind computer, and Project Whirlwind's "most famous contribution was the random-access, magnetic core storage feature."[13] 

[Reference:]

13.  Redmond, Kent C.; Smith, Thomas M. (1980). Project Whirlwind - The History of a Pioneer Computer. Bedford, Mass.: Digital Press. p. 215. ISBN 0932376096.

--- end wiki extract ---

The above wiki page also states, "The first core memory of 32 x 32 x 16 bits was installed on Whirlwind in the summer of 1953."

The above info. gives us the background to understand why IBM was keenly interested in Wang's patent for memory cores (as well as others' memory cores patents), and also his technical consultancy on applications of memory cores. In the early 1950s IBM was stepping into the field of commercially available mainframe computers with memory cores being a critical part of it. Forrester (of MIT) had made critical advances in memory cores which he had patented and IBM would use memory cores of that type, but as Wang's patent was filed before Forrester's patent, IBM would need both Wang's patent as well as Forrester's (with MIT) patent.

In the initial days of Wang Laboratories (1951), Wang asked IBM whether they would be interested to buy a license to the patent he had applied for. There were discussions between them which went on for long (years) with Wang being given vital advice by the legal firm he was using and its patent lawyer Marty Kirkpartrick. Kirkpartick and Wang proposed that Wang do consulting work for IBM. In November 1953, an agreement was reached where Wang would consult for IBM and would grant IBM a 3 year option to buy a non-exclusive license to the patent he had applied for. This agreement paid Wang a minimum of 1,000 dollars a month, and which work took only around a week's time of Wang per month. This regular income gave Wang Laboratories financial stability. Wang worked on developing a magnetic-core-based calculator for IBM and sent reports to IBM on this work and the time he had spent on it. But Wang writes that he did not think that IBM was interested in this project work. IBM was more interested in the option on Wang's patent and using Wang as a consultant on magnetic cores. Technical people of IBM consulted with Wang on viability of various applications of magnetic cores.

It seems that in the initial years of Wang Laboratories when it was a proprietorship company with few employees other than An Wang, it was more of a consulting business than one doing significant amount of manufacturing and sales of its own products (memory cores and digital devices). Essentially An Wang was selling his technical expertise in specialized digital equipment as consultancy services and that seems to have been the main revenue source for Wang Labs with sales of its own products not bringing in much revenue. 

USA very generously offered An Wang and his wife US citizenship. Wang writes in Lessons that in the mid-1950s "the People's Republic of China intimated that it was going to demand the repatriation of those Chinese students who had stayed in the United States after the revolution. We were contacted by American government officials, who, in a warmly appreciated gesture, offered us the chance to become American citizens." In April 1955, An Wang and his wife gave up Chinese citizenship and became US citizens. Note that the Chinese civil war had ended in 1949. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China : "The Chinese Civil War resulted in a division of territory in 1949 when the CCP led by Mao Zedong established the People's Republic of China on mainland China while the Kuomintang-led ROC government retreated to the island of Taiwan.[n: The KMT solely governed the island until its transition to democracy in 1996.] Both the PRC and the ROC currently claim to be the sole legitimate government of China, resulting in an ongoing dispute even after the United Nations recognized the PRC as the government to represent China at all UN conferences in 1971." So An Wang's home city of Shanghai and nearby areas had come under communist party rule from 1949 (or perhaps earlier), and the side that he had aided in World War 2 by making radio equipment, the nationalists, had retreated to the island of Taiwan.

On 17th May 1955, Wang was issued the patent for which he had applied in Oct. 1949. Critically, there was a one year period after the patent was issued, where the patent could be legally challenged through patent interference. And Wang did have to face at least one patent interference challenge. 

A relevant extract from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetic-core_memory is given below:

Patent disputes

Wang's patent was not granted until 1955, and by that time magnetic-core memory was already in use. This started a long series of lawsuits, which eventually ended when IBM bought the patent outright from Wang for US$500,000.[17] Wang used the funds to greatly expand Wang Laboratories, which he had co-founded with Dr. Ge-Yao Chu, a schoolmate from China.

MIT wanted to charge IBM $0.02 per bit royalty on core memory. In 1964, after years of legal wrangling, IBM paid MIT $13 million for rights to Forrester's patent—the largest patent settlement to that date.[18][19]

[Wiki References:]

17. "An Wang Sells Core Memory Patent to IBM". US: Computer History Museum. Retrieved 12 April 2010.

18. "Magnetic Core Memory". CHM Revolution. Computer History Museum. Retrieved 1 April 2018.

19. Pugh, Emerson W.; Johnson, Lyle R.; Palmer, John H. (1991). IBM's 360 and Early 370 Systems. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. p. 182. ISBN 0-262-16123-0.

--- end extracts from Magnetic-core memory wiki page ---

In Lessons, Wang gives detailed coverage of his and his legal team's negotiations with IBM for sale of his patent including concerns raised by IBM about legal challenges to his patent. Wang also covers in detail the single legal challenge (patent interference) that he had to face. The Lessons account differs quite a bit from what is given in the Magnetic-core memory wiki page extract above.

Wang writes that in mid-1954 IBM started assigning people to work on using core memory in commercial computers, and in 1955 was going toward commercially produced computers with ferrite core memories. But Wang was not aware of these activities of IBM at that time.

As IBM was moving into commercial production of computers with core memories, IBM had to figure out which patents will be coming into play for commercial use of core memories. Forrester had filed his patent for matrix core memory in May 1951 which was legally challenged (patent interference) by Jan Rajchman of RCA who had filed his patent in Sept. 1950. Wang's patent was filed in Oct. 1949 and had broad claims which, as per Wang, "dominated any patent of Forrester's with regard to magnetic storage".

Wang and his legal team considered selling his patent to others instead of IBM but could not find suitable buyers, and realized that they would have to sell to IBM. In the summer of 1955, Wang and legal team discussed "a royalty schedule or outright purchase" of the patent with IBM. They proposed $2.5 million for outright purchase but IBM was not interested to pay so much.

In October 1955, IBM communicated to Wang's legal firm that they would pay "$500,000 plus 70 percent of all royalties accruing from the licensing of cores to third parties". [As per https://www.dollartimes.com/inflation/inflation.php , $500,000 in 1955 adjusted for inflation is $4.87 million in 2021.] But IBM was concerned about legal challenges to Wang's patent. Wang & team and IBM agreed on an investigation to check for potential threats to the patent.

In Lessons, Wang gives quite a detailed account of one of the concerns of IBM that Dr. Howard Aiken and Dr. Way Dong Woo, who were Wang's seniors at the Harvard Computation Laboratory and were working on the same Mark IV computer project that Wang worked on, may claim that the invention was partly or fully theirs. Dr. Woo and Wang had co-authored a research paper on magnetic storage which could also help in such a challenge.

Wang mentions that as part of the investigation, Kirkpatrick took affidavits from some of Wang's former colleagues at Harvard Computation Laboratory who did not mention anything about others contributing to Wang's invention. Dr. Woo was very ill at that time. Kirkpatrick did not interact with Dr. Woo.

Wang writes that it was well known that Dr. Aiken had the view "that all patents coming out of academic computer research should be dedicated to the public". So IBM was concerned that Dr. Aiken may challenge the patent to keep the invention in the public domain. Dr. Aiken had refused to be interviewed by Kirkpatrick.

Eventually there was no patent challenge from Dr. Woo or Dr. Aiken.

IBM was aware of another patent application made by a Frederick W. Viehe (mentioned in Magnetic core memory wiki page extracts above), a Los Angeles public works inspector and perhaps an amateur inventor, in 1947 which they were sure would interfere with Wang's patent. IBM revealed this "thunderbolt" information to Wang and legal team in January 1956 and used this information to pressurize Wang to accept their offer.

Wang also writes that he found it difficult to understand that when this patent interference possibility which IBM felt was surely going to happen, was known to IBM, why IBM was keen on purchasing Wang's patent on the terms they had offered Wang. Wang writes, "Later events suggested that IBM knew more about Mr. Viehe's patent application than they were telling us at that time."

Wang writes that he had spent a lot of time on negotiations with IBM which was a distraction from other work of his company. He writes that his research agreement (which paid him minimum of 1000 dollars per month) and patent licensing option with IBM expired in February of 1956 (this conflicts with Wang's earlier statement in Lessons that he signed this agreement in November 1953 for a three year period). So Wang had to focus on new projects in his company. If he wanted better terms for his patent then that may involve many more years of negotiations.

Wang also had concerns about how serious Viehe's patent challenge would be, as he did not know Viehe's patent details (that would be revealed only when the challenge was made). Wang was not comfortable with the prospect of fighting Viehe's patent challenge on his own. If Wang accepted IBM's offer, then the financial costs of fighting such a patent interference would be on IBM.

Given the above, Wang felt that it would be best for him and his company to accept IBM's offer. In March 1956 Wang accepted IBM's offer of "$500,000 plus 70% of all royalties from the licensing of the cores to third parties" with the last $100,000 of it being withheld under some conditions including if there was interference with the patent. Wang signed the agreement assigning his patent to IBM on 6th March 1956.

In May 1956, shortly before the deadline for patent interference, the Patent Office declared that Wang's patent had an interference with Viehe's patent! During the period when the patent interference hearings were going on, in November 1957 IBM bought the Viehe patent! Wang writes, "IBM is reputed [Ravi: reported?] to have paid Viehe a million dollars for his patent application."

The patent interference hearing went to a decision where Viehe got only one of the claims of Wang's patent which was a minor one. Wang's patent had 34 claims. So it seems that Wang's patent was upheld as the main patent for the magnetic core memory type (delay-line or shift-register memory systems) that Wang had invented. But by then IBM was the owner of both Viehe and Wang patents! And as the Patent Office had declared an interference, Wang forfeited the last $100,000 of the $500,000 deal - so he got paid $400,000 by IBM. It is not clear whether IBM licensed the Wang patent to third parties and if so, whether Wang was paid royalty by IBM.

As Wang had lost 100,000 dollars, he had important questions about IBM's interactions with Viehe while they were negotiating with Wang for purchasing Wang's patent. He wondered, "Where did Viehe get the idea to challenge my patent?" Wang's lawyers told him that it would involve considerable expense to try to prove that IBM was involved in Viehe's challenging Wang's patent, and that chances of success in such an effort were slim. IBM told Wang's lawyers that when they first met Viehe's lawyer, he did not show Viehe's patent to them. But IBM did not disclose when they first met Viehe's lawyer.

IBM seems to have used some negotiating tricks to bargain down the money Wang was asking for his patent! Sad but that's the reality of many such mega company negotiations. 

The IEEE bio expresses An Wang's bitterness with IBM very well with some word play on stored and memory words, "Wang forfeited the $100,000 and stored in his memory a lifelong grudge against IBM."

The 400,000 dollars that Wang received from IBM in 1956 (the payment schedule details are not given but one presumes the 400,000 dollars were paid in installments or as a lump sum, in 1956 itself), is equivalent to 3.88 million dollars in 2021 after adjusting for inflation as per https://www.dollartimes.com/inflation/inflation.php . Wang writes that in 1956 he earned about 10,000 dollars a year from his company, Wang Laboratories. So the 400,000 dollars he received, Wang writes in Lessons, "had the effect of making me well off overnight". To put it in other words, 400,000 dollars was 40 times Wang's annual income at that time.

Wang does not mention how much he had to spend on legal fees for the patent and the patent negotiations with IBM.

Note that the extract from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetic-core_memory shared earlier in this post, informs us, "In 1964, after years of legal wrangling, IBM paid MIT $13 million for rights to Forrester's patent—the largest patent settlement to that date". MIT may not have given in to IBM's pressure tactics as it was a large and established institution which perhaps was in no hurry to sell, and perhaps had the legal resources to fight protracted patent interference challenges, and so could get a lot more money than Wang, but 8 years later than IBM's payment to Wang. Further, Forrester's patented matrix core memory which was first used in MIT's Whirlwind computer in 1953, would have been closer to the memory core IBM used in the commercial mainframe computers it produced and sold, and so perhaps IBM was willing to pay more for Forrester's patent than Wang's patent.

Wang writes, "I seriously doubt that after IBM bought the patent, anyone there thought that they would encounter me or Wang Laboratories again". But in later years, Wang Laboratories competed with IBM in some product areas. Wang writes that the negotiations with IBM on selling the patent exposed him to "IBM's no-holds-barred style of competition". In future years, as Wang Laboratories competed with IBM in some product areas, Wang had other encounters with these tactics of IBM, but with Wang Laboratories being much stronger then and so being able to give a better fight to IBM.


An Wang repays Harvard generosity and noble attitude towards him in 1940s and early 1950s by gifting Harvard millions of dollars in later years

I wonder how Wang's colleagues at Harvard Computation Laboratory, including Dr. Howard Aiken who believed that academic computer research inventions should be in public domain, and Dr. Way Dong Woo, felt when they came to know of Wang being paid $400,000 in 1956 by IBM for his memory core patent, which news perhaps would have been kept confidential for some years but would have got known eventually. That is the human side of this matter. Without Dr. Howard Aiken's work on the Mark IV computer, and his assigning of the memory problem to Dr. Wang, Dr. Wang would not have been able to make this invention and patent it. And without Harvard providing the infrastructure and funds (including salaries, I guess), Harvard Computation Laboratory would not have been there for Wang to make his invention. Perhaps Harvard and Dr. Aiken took the high and noble way where they chose not to challenge Wang's patent as joint work of Wang and others at Harvard Computation Laboratory and claim that Harvard as an institution also had a part claim to the patent. In this context, I should repeat what is said earlier in this post, that Wang sought the advice of Harvard administration before he applied for the patent (in 1949) and that Harvard administration told him to apply for the patent at his own expense. So Wang did not do anything behind Harvard's back and Wang also informed Dr. Aiken that he had applied for the patent shortly after doing so.

A thought struck me that the noble and charitable thing for An Wang to have done, on receiving 400,000 dollars for his patent from IBM, would have been to donate part of the money to Harvard Computation Laboratory as a recognition of the goodness of Harvard Computation Laboratory to allow him to file the patent and sell it, without contesting the patent as joint work of Harvard Computation Laboratory and An Wang, or as public domain work. 100,000 dollars being donated to Harvard Computation Laboratory would have been a noble and good thing for An Wang to have done then.

Wang does not seem to have given any money to Harvard then (in 1956), but in later years he made donations to Harvard totaling $4 million! For details see: CHINESE IMMIGRANT EMERGES AS BOSTON'S TOP BENEFACTOR, https://www.nytimes.com/1984/05/05/us/chinese-immigrant-emerges-as-boston-s-top-benefactor.html , 5th May 1984. The article also shows the humility and gratitude of An Wang towards Harvard in 1984 at which time he had become a very rich man. Wang is quoted as saying: "I was fortunate that as soon as I got to the United States in 1945, I was admitted to Harvard".. "Harvard introduced me to computers (in 1948) and let me in on the very early stage of their development" .. "I am honored that Harvard lets me show my appreciation." So An Wang very graciously repaid Harvard's generosity and nobility towards him in the second half of 1940s and early 1950s, when he was a young graduate student and later PhD student in Harvard, followed by a stint as research fellow in Harvard Computation Laboratory, with gifts of millions of dollars.


An Wang incorporating Wang Laboratories in 1955 with only Wang's family owning stock as per Lessons; Wikipedia perhaps wrongly says G.Y. Chu was co-founder; G.Y. Chu was a long term and technically proficient employee of Wang Labs.

Even before IBM paid Wang $400,000 for his patent (in 1956), in anticipation of substantial sum of money coming from the sale of patent, An Wang incorporated Wang Laboratories. Wang writes in Lessons that as a sole proprietorship, he was personally liable for the debts of his company and so the money he would get from patent sale would be at risk (if the company ran into big debt). Incorporating the company removed this risk.

[Incorporation separates the company's assets and income from that of its owners and investors. There is limited liability for its shareholders as they can take profits through dividend and stock appreciation of the company but they are not held personally liable for the debts of the company. For more, please visit https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/corporation.asp and https://www.investopedia.com/terms/i/incorporate.asp .]

As I was writing and updating this post, I came across the conflict between Wikipedia and some other sources which claim that G.Y. Chu co-founded Wang Laboratories with An Wang, and the Lessons book account which mentions G.Y. Chu as an employee but NOT as a co-founder. 

Let me share the related Wikipedia statements as of 20th July 2021. First from Wang Laboratories,  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Laboratories : "Wang Laboratories was a computer company founded in 1951, by An Wang and G. Y. Chu.[1]" Reference 1 is: "American Stock Exchange delists Wang stocks" https://www.upi.com/Archives/1993/03/17/American-Stock-Exchange-delists-Wang-stocks/2976732344400 . UPI (United Press International). March 17, 1993.

The above reference (upi.com article) states: "Founded in 1951 by Dr. An Wang, a Chinese immigrant who invented magnetic computer memory, the company was a major player in the high- tech industry but began slipping in the mid-1980s." But there is no mention of G.Y. Chu in it! From where did this Wikipedia page get G.Y. Chu's name as a co-founder?

The second Wikipedia page for this matter is: An Wang,  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Wang . As on 20th July 2021, it has two relevant statements: "Wang founded Wang Laboratories in June 1951 as a sole proprietorship." And "In 1955, when the core memory patent was issued, Wang sold it to IBM for $500,000 and incorporated Wang Laboratories with Ge-Yao Chu, a schoolmate." The wiki page does not provide any references for these statements.

Searching on the Internet did not give me a definitive answer on whether G.Y. Chu was a co-founder of Wang Laboratories Inc. (when it was incorporated in 1955). I think there is no question that at the time of founding the company as a sole proprietorship company in 1951, it was An Wang alone who was in the picture and G.Y. Chu was not involved at all at that time.

This Boston Globe obituary on G.Y. Chu, dated 2011, states that he was a co-founder, "Dr. Ge Yao Chu, cofounder of Wang Laboratories; at 93",  http://archive.boston.com/bostonglobe/obituaries/articles/2011/08/30/dr_ge_yao_chu_cofounder_of_wang_laboratories_at_93/ . The relevant sentences in it are: "In 1956, An Wang, a classmate from Shanghai, brought Dr. Chu in as one of the founders of Wang Laboratories Inc., which manufactured mainly computers and electronic calculators. At the time, Wang had 12 employees, Dr. Chu wrote, and his salary was $200 per month. Things changed when Wang Labs went public in 1967.

Dr. Chu, a senior vice president and member of Wang Laboratories’ board of directors, retired in 1978 at 60." However, I am not sure whether Boston Globe has been accurate (in 2011) in saying that G.Y. Chu was a co-founder.

In the Lessons book, An Wang states (on page 114): ".. on June 30, 1955, Wang Laboratories officially became a corporation. I was the president and treasurer, and myself, my wife, Lorraine, and Marty Kirkpatrick comprised the first board of directors. At that point, the company's assets consisted of twenty-five thousand dollars, and its balance sheet was a single handwritten piece of notebook paper. Its original stock issue consisted of fifteen thousand shares of preferred stock, a fifteen-thousand-dollar debenture, and a hundred shares of common stock, all held by me. However, I very quickly reduced the amount of my holdings by giving stock to my wife and family."

The above extract from Lessons clearly states that at the time of incorporation Wang held all stock of the company - Wang Laboratories Incorporated (and shortly later gave some of the stock he held to his family but NOT to G.Y. Chu). So as per above account, G.Y. Chu cannot be viewed as a co-founder.

As per Lessons book index, "Chu, G. Y."  is mentioned only on page 132. That mention is in the context of improving the LOCI calculator product of Wang Labs. and studying the competition. The related sentence is: "There was an advertisement for the Friden electronic calculator in the Wall Street Journal, and so Dr. G. Y. Chu (an engineer I had recruited), Marty Miller, and I arranged to take a look at it - ostensibly as potential customers." So An Wang is clearly referring to G.Y. Chu as an employee he recruited and NOT a co-founder of the company.

However, I think it is possible that while G.Y. Chu did not own stock of Wang Laboratories Inc. at the time of company incorporation (in 1955), and seems to have joined the company only in 1956 (some months to a year after the company got incorporated), perhaps after An Wang got money from IBM from patent sale, he may have been viewed as a long time technical colleague of An Wang in the company, and so viewed as a kind of or virtually co-founder, though he was not really a co-founder.

But from accuracy of history of An Wang and Wang Laboratories point of view, I think G.Y. Chu was NOT a co-founder of Wang Laboratories. I wonder if I write to Wikipedia about this, whether they will consider my point of view and make suitable changes to the pages.

It is also appropriate to give some more info. about G.Y. Chu from the above mentioned Boston Globe obituary article. The article gives an account of Dr. Chu's life including his work at Wang Laboratories. It states that Chu was a graduate of Shanghai Jiao Tong university (which is the same as Chiao Tung University in Shanghai mentioned earlier in this post). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_Jiao_Tong_University states, "The word "Jiao Tong" (交通), formerly romanized as "Chiao Tung", means transportation or communication. It reflects the university's root — it was founded by the Ministry of Posts and Communications of the late Qing dynasty."

Chu came to USA in 1946, sent by "Central Electric Works" (seems to be a Chinese company/orgn. then) "to study engineering, manufacturing, and applications of protective relays for electrical power systems at Westinghouse Electric Co. in New Jersey". He moved to Cambridge in 1948 to do his Masters (earned in 1949) and later doctorate (earned in 1953) at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Electrical engineering. Shortly after being accepted by MIT, Chu was helped by MIT Professor John G. Trump to obtain visas for his wife and child, who joined him in USA.

The article shares appreciation for the great technical work done by G.Y. Chu in Wang Labs. (including many patents for inventions done by him at Wang) from a former employee whom Chu mentored and from his son. His son is quoted as saying, "the breadth of his engineering experience and ability enabled him to transition successfully from high voltage applications, to semiconductors, to computers, and to hardware systems over his career." .. "He was responsible for developing one of the world’s first Chinese language word processor".

There is confusion about timeline in Wikipedia pages about Wang Laboratories founding and incorporation, and Wang being paid by IBM for sale of his patent. So let me give below what seems to be the accurate timeline:

  • June 1951 - Wang Laboratories is founded as a sole proprietorship company by An Wang.
  • 30th June 1955 - Wang Laboratories is incorporated as Wang Laboratories Incorporated with all stock owned by An Wang. In a short while after incorporation, An Wang reduced his holdings by giving stock to his family.
  • 6th March 1956 - Wang signs agreement with IBM assigning his patent to IBM for $500,000 but with $100,000 of it to be withheld if there is patent interference. 
  • On or after 6th March 1956 - Wang is paid $400,000 by IBM. The Lessons book does not specify the payment schedule and whether it was paid in installments or as a single payment. But I got the impression on reading this part of the book that Wang got the entire $400,000 in 1956 itself.
  • May 1956 - Patent interference is declared for Wang's patent (with Viehe's patent) by US patent office. Wang forfeits $100,000 of the $500,000 that IBM had agreed to pay him. The patent interference hearings go on for some years. As per Lessons book, the decision came on 29th December 1959 when only one count (claim) of Wang's patent went to Viehe but all other claims (33 of total 34) of Wang's patent continued to be held by Wang. When the interference (with Viehe's patent) was declared in May 1956, the patent office had said that 16 of the 34 claims of Wang's patent were involved in the interference.

Response to comment 

I had shared the above section text on Facebook and provided that link on my LinkedIn post: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/ravi-s-iyer-13a55310_an-wang-incorporating-wang-laboratories-in-activity-6823346613734506496-EwT1 . Given below is a slightly edited response of mine to a comment on that LinkedIn post: 

Thanks --name-snipped-- for your views. I have never worked on an IBM mainframe (or minicomputer). So it is interesting for me to know your view that Wang computers were easier to program (in various programming languages) than IBM mainframe.

I think An Wang did get a lot of recognition from USA govt., the computer field as well as US academia.

An Wang was among 12 naturalized US citizens who were awarded the Medal of Liberty by US President Ronald Reagan in 1986, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medal_of_Liberty . This wiki page states, "The Medal of Liberty was awarded in 1986 by President Ronald Reagan as part of the festivities commemorating the 100th anniversary of the Statue of Liberty. The awarding of this medal took place only once, as it was linked to a specific event. No other Medals of Liberty have been awarded since Liberty Weekend 1986, although it is possible more may be awarded on future occasions." 

An Wang was recognized as a computer pioneer by IEEE Computer Society, https://history.computer.org/pioneers/index.html .

An Wang was inducted into US National Inventors Hall of Fame in 1988, https://www.invent.org/inductees/wang .

Wang was also recognized as one of Massachusetts' great philanthropists as he gave a lot of money to charity in that state, and also served in overseer role for top educational administrations in the state. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Wang#Later_years gives some details of his philanthropy. Note that there are An Wang professorships in Harvard, Brown and Boston universities. From the wiki page: ".. An Wang Professorship of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at Harvard University, held by Roger W. Brockett and Hanspeter Pfister, the An Wang Professorship of Computer Science at Brown University, held by John E. Savage, and the Wang Professorship of Cognitive and Neural Systems at Boston University, held by Stephen Grossberg .."

But I think that the rather dramatic collapse of Wang Laboratories in the late 1980s and early 1990s, culminating in filing for bankruptcy in August 1992, resulted in An Wang losing the hero status he had acquired in the early to mid 1980s. But then it was not Wang Labs. alone that bit the dust in those times. Its key competitors in the minicomputers field like DEC also bit the dust. The PC revolution and some other tech. field changes in the late 1980s and 1990s killed many of the minicomputer companies.

I think https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Laboratories#Decline_and_fall states it well: 'Although Wang manufactured desktops, its main business by the 1980s, was its VS line of mini-computer and "midframe" systems. The market for these mini-computers was ultimately conquered by enhanced micro-computers like the Apple Macintosh and the "Wintel" PC on one end and Sun, IBM and Hewlett-Packard servers on the other end.' 

--- end my comment response ---

 

Government contracts work some of which led to Wang Labs' commercial (component) products of transistor logic cards like Logiblocs and control units like Weditrol (1955 to early 1960s)

Wang writes in Lessons that in the years following the patent sale to IBM, "Wang Laboratories gradually changed from a proprietorship whose primary business was consulting in digital electronics, into a company the developed and sold its own products." I think that is a clear statement by Wang that prior to 1956 sale of his patent to IBM, the memory core and digital electronics devices Wang Labs. made and sold, did not earn significant revenue for the company. It was Wang's consulting service that earned significant revenue for the company. But perhaps these memory cores and digital electronics devices made it easier for Wang to convince his consultancy business clients about his proficiency in digital electronics.

Wang writes that when Wang Labs. was primarily a consulting business, it did not need a sales force, large-scale manufacturing facility or a servicing operation. But when Wang Labs. moved into selling its own products, it needed these capabilities.

As per Lessons, in 1954, Wang Labs had moved to Cambridge, Mass. But it is not clear how many employees it had at that time. Lessons does not seem to give a clear picture of how much of the money from patent sale to IBM  (in March 1956) was used by An Wang to grow Wang Labs Inc. (it gives some info. but that is quite limited info.). It also does not specify whether and if so, how many, employees were additionally recruited to Wang Labs Inc. immediately after receiving money of patent sale. But I guess that Wang Labs. did recruit some more people after patent sale - I think G.Y. Chu was recruited then. Wang also got the financial base to enter into some products like Logiblocs and Weditrol control units which are covered below.

As Wang's consulting agreement with IBM ended (in 1956, I think) or some time before it ended, Wang looked for government contracts to replace the lost revenue. He got a US Air Force contract to help airports measure the cloud ceiling. Wang built an "angular encoder" for this purpose and used the new technology at commercial level, of transistors. Wang writes that transistors allowed digital electronics inventors/designers to put electrical components into modules and link them on a printed circuit board. Boards that performed basic logical functions were called "logic cards" which Wang says, "were the forerunners of today's semiconductor chips".

While working on the US Air Force contract to measure the cloud ceiling, it struck Wang that he could sell such boards having individual logic functions, which customers could customize and use in their own digital electronics solutions. Wang called these boards "Logiblocs" and sold it to his contacts in the industry. There were other companies too then including DEC which sold similar boards.

In the second half of 1950s, as transistors were making a major impact in digital electronics industry, Wang expanded on his angular encoder invention to create an automated control system that would operate tools like lathes and grinders based on instructions fed to the system via an input mechanism like punched cards or paper tape. These systems were sold to machine tool using companies or companies that made machine tools. 

Wang company also sold components of this system separately if customers wanted to use such components to build their own automated control system. These components were sold under the brand name Weditrol (Wang Electronic Digital Control Units). Wang writes that they made and sold around 60 to 80 units in a year in 1958 and 1959, with each unit selling at 700 dollars.


In 1959, Wang Labs gets 150,000 dollars (loan + capital) from established machine tools company Warner & Swasey in exchange for 25% shares of Wang Labs

Wang writes in Lessons that in 1958 when Wang Labs had 10 employees, Wang used some of the patent sale money from IBM to buy land along Route 128 in Massachusetts for expansion. However, after the purchase and after Wang had bought "good deal of building materials", the government of Massachusetts took the land for road widening. Wang writes that it took some time for the government to pay him the 60,000 dollars he had invested in the Route 128 land.

Wang solved the expansion problem temporarily by leasing 6000 sq. ft of office park space in Natick, a suburb of Boston. But An Wang's financial position was stretched. A bank in Boston which was interested in high technology companies, provided a credit line that resolved Wang's short-term cash flow issues.

However, to maintain company growth momentum, Wang needed to recruit more staff - administrative, sales and engineering staff, and that needed more credit than Wang's bank was willing to provide. This is when the bank suggested an alliance with one of Wang's major customers - Warner & Swasey machine tool company based in Cleveland, [in state of Ohio], which did 56 million dollars a year in business. [This seems to be the company's wiki page:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warner_%26_Swasey_Company .] An officer of Wang's bank acted as the broker. Wang needed $150,000 for his expansion over the next one and a half years. Warner & Swasey would provide that money, with $50,000 of it used acquire shares of Wang Labs. equivalent to 25 percent of the company's shares, and $100,000 being given as a loan. Warner & Swasey would also get a seat in board of directors of Wang company. Wang Labs. was expected to benefit from inner view of business methods followed by the much larger Warner & Swasey. This agreement was made in fall of 1959.

The Lessons book account gives a mixed view of this move. Wang says that when he mentioned it to his accountant, Malcom Viar, after conclusion of the deal, his accountant told Wang that he had made a mistake as he had given away too much of the company (25 percent) for that sum of money, and that he would have to face "the handicap of minority controls". Wang writes that his accountant was right. On page 116, Wang writes, ".. I regretted the alliance almost at once". 

Wang then says something quite confusing. He writes that he had enough money from the patent sale and did not need Warner & Swasey's money. But he goes on to say that had some of the money from patent sale not been tied up in the Route 128 land that was taken over by the government, he would have been able to finance the expansion himself or found another way without having to give up 25 percent of the company's shares to an outsider. That is not so clear. As per Wang, 60,000 dollars was the sum that was involved in the Route 128 land. Wang got 400,000 dollars from IBM. Assuming some money for legal expenses, one can say that Wang would have 350,000 dollars to spend. Presuming that he had spent 100,000 dollars of this on the company by then, and say 50,000 dollars for his family, he still had 200,000 dollars spare. Perhaps Wang did not want to spend all this money on the company, and therefore opted for involving others' money in the company, thereby losing 25% of his company's shares and having minority control over his company.

Wang writes that on inside look at the business methods of larger company aspect, Wang was disappointed to see that there was "bureaucracy and internal strife" at Warner & Swasey, and while at that time, machine tool controls were a large part of Wang Labs business, Wang was not so interested in making machine tools the future of Wang Labs. 

As per Wang, Warner & Swasey benefited enormously from the deal as they "made a hundred million dollars on their fifty-thousand-dollar" shares part of the investment. One presumes that Wang Labs. paid back the loan of one hundred thousand dollars given by Warner & Swasey.

Wang writes, "The alliance with Warner & Swasey caused problems for me and Wang Laboratories far in excess of any benefits I derived from using their money rather than my own." He writes that in hindsight, he thinks that the mistake he made was that he had overstretched himself (in expansion of his company), and so had got into a vulnerable position from where he could not negotiate well while seeking funds for his company's expansion.

On page 121, Wang presents the other side of the picture. He writes the money he got from Warner & Swasey enabled him to take up the (successful product development) projects of Linasec and also Wang's new desk-top calculator (LOCI product line) that were key to growth of Wang Laboratories. [Linasec and LOCI are covered in later sections of this post.]

As a reader of the Lessons book, the impression I am getting is that at the time An Wang got into an alliance with Warner & Swasey, Wang Labs. was not having any major stand-alone system products and was essentially a component supplier company to larger companies like Warner & Swasey. Perhaps An Wang lacked the confidence and the knowledge to take Wang Labs., by himself, to the next stage of producing stand-alone system products. Perhaps the alliance with the larger and well established Warner & Swasey company, gave him the confidence, and also raised the profile of Wang Labs. in the industry then, to do it. I mean, it may have been not the money alone but also the backing of the name of Warner & Swasey, that enabled An Wang to take Wang Labs. to the next level as a company that could make and sell its own stand-alone system products.

Dr. James C. Hodge was the executive vice-president of Warner & Swasey at the time of the alliance being formed. Dr. Hodge later became a director of Wang Laboratories. An Wang says he has respect for Dr. Hodge but does not credit Dr. Hodge with any critical advice during this period when Wang Labs. grew from component supplier to stand-alone system products maker/manufacturer (Linasec and LOCI). However, I do think that as a member of the board of directors of Wang Labs., and as a representative of 25% share holding Warner & Swasey company, it is quite possible that Dr. Hodge would have provided vital advice to Dr. Wang on how to go about this period of major growth for Wang Labs. But that is speculation.

What seems to be fact is that Wang Labs. got into its major growth phase from a component supplier company to a stand-alone system product maker and seller company (Linasec was only making but LOCI was both making and selling) with significantly larger revenue after its alliance with Warner & Swasey with the latter having 25% stock of Wang Labs. So I think there surely is a possibility that Warner & Swasey alliance benefited Wang Labs. much more than what An Wang is giving credit for it, in his book, Lessons.

Wang writes that in mid-1970s Warner & Swasey had about 6 percent of Wang Labs. stock (they would have sold or given the other Wang Labs. stock they had) which they were carrying on their books at cost. Wang warned Warner & Swasey of the danger of some predator coming to know of this and move to acquire them. A company called Bendix,  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bendix_Corporation , whose president was William Agee, as per An Wang, got on the trail of Warner & Swasey with plans to acquire the company, and then sell its Wang Labs. stock to pay for the acquisition. Warner & Swasey then asked whether Wang Labs would want to help them out by buying their company but An Wang was not interested. Eventually Bendix bought Warner & Swasey in 1980 as per https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warner_%26_Swasey_Company . The wiki page makes no mention of Bendix paying for the acquisition by selling its Wang Labs. stock. Further, this New York Times article: Bendix Tops AMCA Bid For Warner & Swasey Both Companies Enter New Offers,  https://www.nytimes.com/1979/12/15/archives/bendix-tops-amca-bid-for-warner-swasey-both-companies-enter-new.html , 15th Dec. 1979, states that Warner & Swasey approved of Bendix's revised offer and were against AMCA bid.


Wang Labs' first major commercial product success - Linasec, a computer to prepare justified punched tape to drive linotype typesetting machines - but as contract work for another company - Compugraphic (1963-65); Linasec boosts Wang Labs' sales, for the first time, to beyond 1 million dollars in fiscal 1964

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compugraphic : "In 1963, Compugraphic moved to North Reading and commissioned Massachusetts-based Wang Laboratories to develop the Linasec, a computer used to prepare justified punched tape to drive linotype typesetting machines which were widely used in the printing industry, which at that time was based entirely on hot metal type."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Laboratories#Typesetters refers to Linasec as an "electronic special purpose computer" and I think that seems to be an accurate description.

As per Lessons book, Compugraphic provided the specifications of a phototypesetting machine with semi-automated justification capability. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typographic_alignment#Justified "A common type of text alignment in print media is "justification", where the spaces between words and between glyphs or letters are stretched or compressed in order to align both the left and right ends of consecutive lines of text."

Breaking words that were not fitting in a line by hyphenating the words (with the second part of the hyphenated word being taken to the next line) were one of the issues that had to be tackled. Rather than attempt to automate the hyphenation of a long word that did not fit at the end of a line, which would require expensive computer hardware and memory, as per Compugraphic's suggestion, the machine simply stopped when it encountered this condition and signaled the operator showing him the condition on a CRT screen and who would do or indicate how the hyphenation should be done. Then the machine would continue with its task of justifying the text.

Wang Labs. had to design and build this machine (as per Compugraphic specifications). Compugraphic would market it. An Wang writes that at the time Compugraphic approached him, they said they were not interested in manufacturing the machine themselves.

The burden of financing the design and building of the machine was on Wang Labs. There does not seem to have been any upfront payment from Compugraphic to Wang Labs. for this. Instead Compugraphic would pay Wang Labs. on sale of each machine. So Wang Labs. seems to also have had the risk that if the machine they built did not sell, they would not be paid anything.

Wang Labs. designed, patented (but with Compugraphic having right to manufacture the machine without paying royalty to Wang Labs.), and built this machine in less than a year's time using 3 man years of engineering work. At that time Wang Labs. had about 20 employees and so this involved heavy usage of Wang Labs. resources.

As this machine called Linasec was much cheaper than the competition's machines, Compugraphic sold a large number of them, mostly to small newspaper publishers. Depending on peripherals sold with Linasec, Wang Labs. received around 30,000 dollars for each Linasec machine Compugraphics sold. The machines were not sold as Wang machines (not under Wang logo) and one can presume that the machines would have been sold as Compugraphic machines.

Linasec was a major commercial success for Wang Labs. from revenue earning point of view (but not as brand name as the machines were not sold as Wang machines). Wang writes that in 1963 they booked orders of Linasec worth around $300,000, going up to around $470,000 in 1964, and around $640,000 in 1965. Due to the sales of Linasec machines, for the first time, Wang Labs. sales crossed 1 million dollars in fiscal year 1964.

Then Compugraphic delivered a shock to Wang Labs by deciding to manufacture Linasec themselves (they did not have to pay royalty to Wang as per their agreement). Wang Labs. did not have marketing ability then to directly sell Linasec machines and so they could not compete with Compugraphic. It is not clear which year this happened. Wang writes that by the time this decision was taken by Compugraphic, Wang Labs. had made around 70 of these machines which had brought in around two million dollars in revenue. Wang Labs. had projected an additional million dollars in revenue from Linasec in the short-term future but that now was in jeopardy. Wang writes, "We were about to lose two-thirds of our next year's projected revenue. I vowed at that time never again to design and manufacture a product for another company to market."

Wang writes that despite Compugraphic decision to manufacture Linasec themselves, he had few regrets about the Linasec project. It was Wang Labs. "most challenging technical project" till then and its success was "rewarding in and of itself".

The impression I got as I read the Lessons book is that Wang Labs. would not have been able to get into phototypesetting machine field by themselves. Compugraphic knew the field, had the potential customers, the idea about Linasec machine in terms of what features it should have (its specifications), and the vital ability to sell/market Linasec machine to customers. Linasec seems to have been the first commercially successful stand-alone system product manufactured by Wang, even if it was sold by Compugraphic under its brand name. Prior to that, Wang Labs.' successful commercial products were components (Logiblocs and Weditrol boards/units) which did not earn Wang Labs large revenue. Linasec boosted Wang Labs into 1 million dollar sales in a year company bracket.

Producing Linasec for Compugraphic would have boosted the confidence of An Wang as well as Wang Labs employees that they could now look at stand-alone system products made and also sold by them. Having crossed 1 million dollars in sales would have been a strong confidence booster in terms of selling and revenue earning capability too. So I think designing and producing Linasec for Compugraphic as per the latter's specifications, seems to have been a critical learning and growing step for Wang Labs. It set the stage for Wang Labs. to break out on its own for making and selling successful stand-alone system products.

https://www.oldcalculatormuseum.com/wangloci.html provides some interesting details about the Linasec machine. The name Linasec came from the machine having the ability to perform justification of text operation at about one line of text per second! The article states that the machine was a great success.

https://www.historyofinformation.com/detail.php?id=806 mentions Compugraphic Linasec I and II machines. It states, "These automated tape processors produced justified tapes to drive the Linotype machines used in the newspaper industry." .. "Net production of the Linasec— in excess of 3,600 lines per hour compared to the manually-set 600 lines per hour— enabled newspapers to carry more detailed, late breaking news stories."

In 1964 Wang Labs with 35 employees then, moved from Natick to an 85 acre site in Tewksbury, Massachusetts.


Dr. Wang designs compact electronic circuits (< 300 transistors) to calculate logarithms and more, leading to Wang LOCI-2 Electronic Desktop Calculator, perhaps the first major successful own product of Wang Labs (1965-66)

While Linasec machines were being provided to Compugraphic, Wang Labs came up with what seems to be their first major successful own product line, the LOCI calculator line (LOCI standing for logarithmic calculating/computing instrument). 

One of the products of this Wang product line, Wang LOCI-2, made it to the Smithsonian museum (National Museum of American History)!


Wang LOCI-2 Electronic Calculator, Pic courtesy:  https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/nmah_334290 . The page also has a textual description of LOCI-2. 

So quite literally this seems to be the first Wang Labs manufactured and sold (on its own name) product, to make history!

The same link given earlier - https://www.oldcalculatormuseum.com/wangloci.html  - gives a lot of historical details about LOCI product line. An Wang hand-picked the people involved in designing this product line and got personally involved too.

Wang clearly states in Lessons that the Warner & Swasey money was used for developing LOCI.

As per Dr. Wang, in early 1960s, more complex calculations than addition or subtraction, like multiplication or division, needed a mainframe computer. While some desktop calculators were available from companies like Olivetti, Monroe and Friden, complex calculations were very cumbersome to do on these calculators.

Wang writes, "LOCI, which fit on a desk top and whose sixty-five-hundred-dollar base cost was but a tiny fraction of the price of a mainframe, could add, subtract, multiply, divide, compute roots, and generate exponential values with the stroke of a few keys."

The key to all this ability was LOCI's ability to calculate logarithms quickly and doing operations like multiplication and division as addition and subtraction of logarithms of those numbers (and, I presume, then using antilogarithm to arrive at result number).

Dr. Wang designed the digital circuits that gave the logarithm of an arbitrary number quickly and accurately, using factor combining method, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CORDIC . These digital circuits also performed other calculations. This ability made the LOCI calculators stand out against the competition.

Dr. Wang's genius for coming up with new electronic designs implementing known mathematical methods, in this case implement factor combining in electronic design to quickly calculate logarithms, and also perform other calculations, paid off with the product attracting attention in the desktop calculator space. Dr. Wang writes, "I could generate logarithms and then perform calculations using logic circuits that required less than three hundred transistors." Wang writes that LOCI calculated logarithms with one keystroke and in fifty milliseconds.

An extract from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Laboratories#Calculators is given below:

Using factor combining it was probably the first desktop calculator capable of computing logarithms, quite an achievement for a machine without any integrated circuits.[11] The electronics included 1,275 discrete transistors. It actually performed multiplication by adding logarithms, and roundoff in the display conversion was noticeable: 2 times 2 yielded 3.999999999.

[References:]

11. Wang Laboratories (December 1966), "Now you can determine Copolymer Composition in a few minutes at your desk", Analytical Chemistry, 38 (13): 62A–63A, doi:10.1021/ac50155a005  https://doi.org/10.1021%2Fac50155a005

--- end wiki extract --- 

As per Dr. Wang, LOCI could be programmed and provided data via buttons on the console or punched paper cards. A teletype could be attached to LOCI which could then function as a terminal or a printer. Very interestingly, LOCI could be configured in such a way that several keyboards could act as terminals for one LOCI.

The first product in the line - LOCI-1 - seems to have been introduced in 1964. But it seems to have got sidelined by an enhanced product, the LOCI-2 sold from 1965. The LOCI-2 was programmable whereas the LOCI-1 was not.

LOCI-2's list price seems to have been $6,500.

LOCI-2 was shown in trade shows and became a big hit with scientists, engineers and mathematicians. LOCI-2 was used in a variety of applications, including in a "Space-Suit Testing System" custom built for NASA by Wang Labs Systems Division!

Dr. Wang writes that as he did not have marketing staff, he chose to market LOCI through "manufacturers' representatives" who marketed products of multiple companies.

Research centers bought LOCI with one such center being Lawrence Livermore Laboratories of the University of California at Berkeley.

As per Lessons book, about 20 LOCI calculators were sold in fiscal 1965 at around 6500 dollars average price, and by 1966 Wang Labs. was selling around 10 of them in a month. LOCI was on the way to become the main revenue earner for the company. 

https://www.oldcalculatormuseum.com/wangloci.html gives details of how the LOCI-2 could be programmed including its "Instruction Set"! It also has a photo of the above mentioned Space-Suit Testing System.

In 1964, Wang Labs. which had 35 employees, moved from Natick to a facility built on 85 acres of what earlier was farmland, with some feeling 85 acres was just too large for the company, Dr. Wang writes that his wife Lorraine would argue for slower growth and thought that the Tewksbury facility would be enough for all growth of the company in future.


Wang Labs. introduces Model 300, an easy to use electronic desktop calculator which business people could use; Its success catapults Wang Labs. to bigger league (1965 to late 1960s)

The Wang 300 calculator product line was a great success that catapulted Wang Labs. into a much bigger league than before. The company underwent great changes as it grew into a multi-million dollar company with its own sales & service network across 40 cities in USA and in a few other countries, and having hundreds of employees by 1967, at which time the company went public with its IPO being very successful.

How Wang Labs. got into the Wang 300 calculator product line is very interesting. Wang writes in Lessons that Wang Labs. employee Marty Miller, a young man who handled the accounts, used to play with the LOCI calculator machine during lunch hour. Marty mentioned casually to Wang that LOCI would be a great business instrument if it were easier to use. That aroused Wang's interest. He discussed it with others and then explored how LOCI could be modified to make it suitable for business people.

They fixed the issue of 2 x 2 producing 3.999999999 instead of 4 by adding rounding function.

LOCI was meant for scientists and engineers who had to know about work registers and accumulators. Wang writes that business people don't want to learn such matters. ".. they want to type in the figures and read the result on the display. For this reason, we took a great deal of time reprogramming the machine to make its keyboard virtually self-explanatory."

The calculator for business people also needed to be simple to maintain. As an example, Wang mentions that some calculators then would "lock" if divide by zero was done. Wang implies that such issues would be unacceptable to business people.

Wang, G.Y. Chu and Marty Miller had a look at the Friden electronic calculator, posing as potential customers, and noted that it was not easy to use and took up a lot of space on the desktop. In the Wang 300 calculator they reduced the space needed for it on the desktop by separating the machine into a keyboard (and display) part which would sit on the desktop without taking up too much desktop space, and an electronics unit which would be on the floor. Note that the term 'keyboard' (unit) in the Model 300 context includes the 10 digit display. Further, the word 'terminal' is used at times, which seems to refer to this keyboard + display unit.

LOCI had the feature of multiple terminals being able to be connected to it but only one terminal could be used at a time. Wang writes in Lessons that Marty Miller said that multiple terminals connected to a calculator would be really useful only if they could be used at the same time. That led to development of a multiplexer which enabled multiple keyboards to be used at the same time, with the electronics part of the calculator.

It is very interesting to note how An Wang and other designers of the Wang 300 calculator got a lot of product ideas from Marty Miller, an accounting work related employee, and so a business user rather than a scientist or an engineer user.

They made savings on circuit boards and on keyboard keys that LOCI used by opting for lower-cost alternate design/components, thereby cutting down cost of the calculator. They also expected that they could manufacture the calculators in good volume and so be able to reduce the cost due to "economies" of "mass manufacture".

Wang writes that with above mentioned approach, ".. we were able to devise a desk-top calculator that was far easier to use than LOCI, and which we could sell at one quarter the price of LOCI." This product called Model 300 (product line) "was the first product made by Wang Laboratories whose end user could be just about anybody."

As per https://www.oldcalculatormuseum.com/wang360.html , "The 300-series machines were first publically (publicly) shown in October of 1965, and received a great deal of interest from a market hungry for (comparatively) low-cost number crunching power. The response was tremendous, giving Wang the confidence to make the investment and begin mass production of the calculators. The first machines went into production in March of 1966. The initial introduction consisted of three models, the 300E, 310E, and 320E." 

When the first models of the Wang 300 series were released, the basic model of 1 Wang 300K (keyboard & display unit) and 1 Wang 300E (Electronics unit) seems to have had a list price of $1,695, which, as per Lessons book, gave a profit margin of 60 to 70 percent. Wang writes that a lower price (like $1,400) was possible but not opted for to avoid the product being viewed as an inferior product as Wang Labs. was not very well known then. The competing Friden calculator was priced at $2,195 and another competitor's product was at $1,795.

Wang writes that they started selling the product in last six months of fiscal year 1966 and achieved sales of 578,000 dollars in that period, which exceeded the sales of LOCI for the whole fiscal year! 

Later, other versions of the product were added to cater to specialized needs like one with statistical functions for scientists and engineers. Programming capability and more storage were provided in newer calculator versions. Wang writes, "We created application packages for particular markets - a program to compute mortgage payments, a program for discounting bonds."

Now for some details and pics of the Model 300 product line. The product separated the desktop unit having a keyboard and a display from the electronics unit with two being connected via cables and with the maximum distance separating them being 200 feet. Another model provided a larger electronics unit which could simultaneously connect to and serve four desktop units. 

http://archive.computerhistory.org/resources/access/text/2009/12/102636486.05.01.sm.pdf seems to be the brochure (8 pages) of the Wang 300 series of calculators which covers the Business Calculator model 300, Statistical Calculator 310, Scientific Calculator 320, Scientific Calculator with Extra Storage models 360 and 362, Card Reader or Programmer model CP-1 compatible with all of Wang Calculator models in the brochure which "Stores up to 80 instructions to automate key board operations by prescored tab-card; two cards for 160 steps. Programmed in easy keyboard language." This brochure seems to be from later years when the Wang 300 series calculators were well established, perhaps in late 1960s or early 1970s. The bottom right of the last page of the brochure has "3/68/50K" - I wonder whether that indicates that the brochure was printed in March 1968.

The front page of the brochure has a pic of the calculator products with the following text: "WANG 300 Series electronic calculators", "Models to solve every computational need ... from basic arithmetic computations to complex equations and programmed calculations, ... wherever speed, simpilicity, reliability and computational value / dollar are important."

The 4 pics below are from the brochure (pics courtesy:  http://archive.computerhistory.org/resources/access/text/2009/12/102636486.05.01.sm.pdf ):

Wang Calculator Model 300 (300K part of it)


Wang Calculator Model 300 single unit configuration of Wang 300K (keyboard & display) device and Wang 300E (Electronics) device.


Wang Calculator Model 300 multiple (4) unit configuration of 4 Wang 300K (keyboard & display) devices and 1 Wang 300SE (Electronics) device.


Left part of pic shows Wang CP-1 Card Programmer (Card reader), right top part shows instruction code for 7 line program and right bottom part shows a card punched with the 7 line program code.

The Wang CP-1 Card Programmer had to be connected between the Wang 300 Electronics device and Wang 300K keyboard and display device.

1965 sales of Wang Labs (all products including LOCI) was $2.5 million, 1966 was $3.8 million and 1967 was $6.9 million with Wang Labs growing to 400 people in 1967. Wang Labs. employed only 35 people in 1964. So that's a tremendous increase in employees in a span of 3 to 4 years. 

A June 1967 price-list for these calculator models can be seen here: https://www.oldcalculatormuseum.com/a-wangpl6-67.html .

Wang writes that building the calculators was more of assembly work for the company than manufacturing as production of the circuit boards was sub-contracted (with designs being provided by Wang Labs). In Wang's Tewksbury facility, the calculators would be assembled and tested. To increase production, Wang did not have to make large capital investment as it was not manufacturing the circuit boards and needed to mainly find and train people to work on assembly and testing, and expand the assembly & testing plant facility. In 1964, the Wang facility at Tewksbury was of twenty thousand square feet. In 1966, 30,000 sq. ft. were added, and in later years they were expanding the facility by 150 percent every 2 years. Note that the land owned by Wang Labs. in Tewksbury was big - 85 acres - which would have easily accommodated such plant/facility expansion.

With Model 300 calculators selling well, Wang Labs. had moved from being a scientific instruments company to a more general field, which required more importance to be given to marketing, sales and service. The company had become more entrepreneurial. Its employees had to adapt to this company transformation with some not being comfortable with the change. Wang writes that he tried to make it easy for such persons "to find some useful nice that would allow them to remain at Wang Laboratories." Others flourished in the new environment, writes Wang, and that he gave them "the opportunity to move ahead no matter what their entry position might have been."

As the company was changing, Wang tried to get consensus on major decisions through meetings where managers of divisions were encouraged to express their opinions (freely).

In 1966, the sales channels had to be changed from manufacturers' representatives to Wang hiring its own salespersons as the former were not able to sell so well in a broad market as compared to specialized market that Wang's earlier products were sold in (e.g. LOCI). Larry Gosnell, who had set up Wang's network of manufacturer's representatives was not comfortable with this change, as probably out of loyalty he was reluctant to drop these representatives, and so left Wang Labs. Joe Nestor was given the work of setting up a network of Wang salesmen. Nestor travelled from city to city across the US, finding and hiring salesmen. Wang writes, "By June 1967, we had eighty people selling our product in forty cities. John Cunningham, who later became president of the company, was among the people we recruited." 

Wang writes that a Wang salesman was provided a desk in shared office space to start off. On his sales crossing a threshold figure, he could choose to have a rented office of his own. Initially when the Model 300 calculators were easy to sell ("virtually sold itself"), Wang came up with a sales commission curve "that grew according to the square root of the increase in sales", resulting in a salesman who sold ten times more than another salesman, getting only (around) three times more commission. Later as there was more competition, some of the salesmen complained, and so Wang changed the formula "instituting a base salary and fixed commissions". Wang writes, "Decisive leadership does not mean inflexible leadership". He further says that if he had not changed the sales commission formula as there was more competition, the company may have lost some good salesmen.

Wang writes that while he had explored overseas markets earlier, it was after Wang Labs was producing the calculator line products that it was appropriate to "establish an international division". Wang's first international offices were in UK (where Wang had many contacts from his earlier consulting work and which shared the common English language), Belgium (as entry point to European continent with products sold to Belgium being easier to resell throughout Europe without encountering tariff barriers) and Taiwan (which had a market for Wang's products and where Wang had moved some labor-intensive manufacturing work like making magnetic core memories used in the calculators, and made substantial savings).

The last page of the brochure mentioned earlier ( http://archive.computerhistory.org/resources/access/text/2009/12/102636486.05.01.sm.pdf whose date may be March 1968 but not known for sure) lists telephone numbers of Sales & Service offices of Wang Labs in 28 US states and over 45 cities in those states, along with one city in Belgium and 5 cities in Canada.

By mid-1967 Wang Labs. had become a noted calculator products company selling calculators to business persons as well as scientists and engineers, with an established sales & service network in USA, and a small international division with offices in 3 countries (besides USA). There was one thing more that was needed for it to get into big league tech. companies of the day - become a publicly held company whose stocks are traded on the stock exchange. That happened in August 1967 and is covered in the next section.

As it was the Wang 300 Series calculators that catapulted Wang Laboratories to a much bigger league, I felt it appropriate to dig a little deeper into these calculator products.

The same brochure mentioned above - http://archive.computerhistory.org/resources/access/text/2009/12/102636486.05.01.sm.pdf - has some info. about the Wang 370/380 Series Programmable Calculator/ Computer which I found to be quite fascinating. I have given that text below:

"Wang 370/380 Series Programmable Calculator/ Computer extends the capabilities of the 300 series to the exact amount of computing power and versatility needed. The system will branch, loop, do sub-routines, make decisions and manipulate arrays. Storage capacity is increased from 4 to 16 to 64 registers with random access from the keyboard or through program control. Programming capabilities can be raised in increments of 80 steps to as many as 480 steps on prescored tab cards or 640 steps on magnetic tape. A teletypewriter with full format control provides automatic printout of data, plus automatic input of data or unlimited program, also optional output writer using teletype as basic mechanism. For On-line Applications, the 379 series of interface modules enable the 370 system to command the read-in of data from instruments, process the data by an automatic program and present the results in display or tabular form or as BCD output signals. The results can be ready for immediate use in data analysis, process control or further transmission.

The 300/370 System is immediately-accessible. The user has direct command and control and receives immediate answers. He is able to proceed directly to the next and most important step -- that of analyzing, interpreting and applying the information generated. All elements of the system are readily-available and can be purchased at less cost than renting a larger, less approachable system for one year."

Hmm. The product was even called a sort-of computer! But even then it was not called a general purpose computer. Those products came out from Wang Labs later on.

https://www.oldcalculatormuseum.com/wang360.html informs us that 370 model was introduced in July 1967 and the 380 model was introduced in March 1968.

https://www.oldcalculatormuseum.com/x-wacclarke.html has a photo of noted Science Fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_C._Clarke , showing an interest in Wang 300 Series calculators.

https://www.oldcalculatormuseum.com/wang360.html (same link mentioned earlier) gives great details of the Wang 360SE Model Calculator system (4 calculator keyboards & displays with 1 Electronics unit).

Given below are some videos of the Wang 300 calculator models.

a) wang calculator, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTlA_tx57e4 , 1 min. 53 secs., published in 2015 by paul congo. This a short video demonstrating functionality of the calculator. Initial part of the video gives some background of how the person has had the model for over 30 years and that it had stopped working but that he could fix it.

b) Wang Series 300 Nixie-Tube Calculator, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1nWQd5SPtAI , 4 min. 53 secs., published in May 2010, shows a Wang 360 KT model calculator (trigonometry + scientific calculator functionality) made in 1967. The unit was repaired and made functional. The video shows the inside of the Electronics unit of the model and then demonstrates usage of the calculator!

c) Wang CP-1 Punch Card Programmer for the 300 Series Calculators, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pek3_1fHUXw , 5 min. 34 secs., published in Dec. 2016 by Mark Palmer. The video demonstrates how the punch card programming works using a Pythagorean theorem (c = square root of (a square + b square)) program. The electronics unit is the 320SE model.

d) Wang 300 Calculator: System Error and Overload Scenarios, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3gR1sboZCY , 2 min. 38 secs. published in May 2019 by Mark Palmer.

I felt it appropriate to provide some background about the electronic calculators field in general at that time from the Calculator wiki page,  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calculator#Development_of_electronic_calculators :

The first mainframe computers, using firstly vacuum tubes and later transistors in the logic circuits, appeared in the 1940s and 1950s. This technology was to provide a stepping stone to the development of electronic calculators.

The Casio Computer Company, in Japan, released the Model 14-A calculator in 1957, which was the world's first all-electric (relatively) compact calculator. It did not use electronic logic but was based on relay technology, and was built into a desk.

In October 1961, the world's first all-electronic desktop calculator, the British Bell Punch/Sumlock Comptometer ANITA (A New Inspiration To Arithmetic/Accounting) was announced.[17][18] This machine used vacuum tubes, cold-cathode tubes and Dekatrons in its circuits, with 12 cold-cathode "Nixie" tubes for its display. Two models were displayed, the Mk VII for continental Europe and the Mk VIII for Britain and the rest of the world, both for delivery from early 1962. The Mk VII was a slightly earlier design with a more complicated mode of multiplication, and was soon dropped in favour of the simpler Mark VIII. The ANITA had a full keyboard, similar to mechanical comptometers of the time, a feature that was unique to it and the later Sharp CS-10A among electronic calculators. The ANITA weighed roughly 33 pounds (15 kg) due to its large tube system.[19] Bell Punch had been producing key-driven mechanical calculators of the comptometer type under the names "Plus" and "Sumlock", and had realised in the mid-1950s that the future of calculators lay in electronics. They employed the young graduate Norbert Kitz, who had worked on the early British Pilot ACE computer project, to lead the development. The ANITA sold well since it was the only electronic desktop calculator available, and was silent and quick.

The tube technology of the ANITA was superseded in June 1963 by the U.S. manufactured Friden EC-130, which had an all-transistor design, a stack of four 13-digit numbers displayed on a 5-inch (13 cm) cathode ray tube (CRT), and introduced Reverse Polish Notation (RPN) to the calculator market for a price of $2200, which was about three times the cost of an electromechanical calculator of the time. Like Bell Punch, Friden was a manufacturer of mechanical calculators that had decided that the future lay in electronics. In 1964 more all-transistor electronic calculators were introduced: Sharp introduced the CS-10A, which weighed 25 kilograms (55 lb) and cost 500,000 yen ($4586.75), and Industria Macchine Elettroniche of Italy introduced the IME 84, to which several extra keyboard and display units could be connected so that several people could make use of it (but apparently not at the same time).

There followed a series of electronic calculator models from these and other manufacturers, including Canon, Mathatronics, Olivetti, SCM (Smith-Corona-Marchant), Sony, Toshiba, and Wang. The early calculators used hundreds of germanium transistors, which were cheaper than silicon transistors, on multiple circuit boards. Display types used were CRT, cold-cathode Nixie tubes, and filament lamps. Memory technology was usually based on the delay line memory or the magnetic core memory, though the Toshiba "Toscal" BC-1411 appears to have used an early form of dynamic RAM built from discrete components. Already there was a desire for smaller and less power-hungry machines.

--- end extract from Calculator wiki page ---

Wang finds mention as a later entrant into the field. I think that with Wang Model 300 calculator line, Wang did not make some pioneering inventions but created a low-cost calculator that was easy to use, as compared to the competition. Friden EC-130 electronic calculator which was one of Wang's main competitors in the field, and which Friden model seems to have been seen by Wang, Chu and Miller when they were exploring design of Model 300, seems to have been a sophisticated calculator of those times. https://www.oldcalculatormuseum.com/friden130.html provides great details on it including many pictures.


1960s "Go-Go Years"; Wang Labs goes public (IPO) in Aug. 1967 to raise funds for retiring debt and for company growth, without Dr. Wang losing family control of company; Why Dr. Wang wanted family control of company; After IPO, from 1 million dollars net worth, Wang Labs. becomes 70 million dollars market capitalization company; Dr. Wang's family's shares value zooms to 50 million dollars

In the Lessons book, Dr. Wang gives a detailed account of why Wang Labs. went public in Aug. 1967, the US stock market sentiment then, and how he and long-term employees of Wang Labs. who had availed of stock options offered to them, were happy, some were thrilled, seeing their Wang Labs. stock price soar in value.

Wang begins Chapter 9, Going Public, of the book with the sentence: "Going public has long been a rite of passage for entrepreneurial high-tech companies." He goes on to say that in the early 1980s (note that the Lessons book was written/published in 1986), "it was not uncommon for computer firms to go public long before they had earnings, and in some cases, even before they had sales or products." 

Wang then writes about the "Go-Go Years" of the late 1960s (till Dec. 1968) which saw "inflated valuations" (for hi-tech companies perhaps) like the early 1980s new issues market. Wang decided to go public in this Go-Go environment as he needed funds to retire short-term debt and for company growth. Wang writes that he recognized the "mood of the times" as a good opportunity for the company, and that the mood might pass.

As Wang Laboratories had good earnings, rapid growth in revenue, and had been in existence for 16 years as a private company, it compared very favourably to some other companies going public then "with scarcely more than a letterhead".

Wang writes that going public (in Aug. 1967) was a "very happy and exciting event for us" but that it was also a "very lucky event". Wang writes that around a year and a half after their public issue, "the Go-Go Years came to a grinding halt, and the new issues market all but died. Eventually a recession brought shareholders face-to-face with the reality that prices on the stock exchange were far higher than anything that might be justified by the prospects for earnings of the companies being traded." Wang writes that if Wang Labs. had not gone public at that time, "the capital markets might well have been closed to us for the next eight years, and our finances extremely stretched."

Ravi: I think the data for Dow Jones Industrial Average given below shows that the Dow went downward from December 1968 till June 1970 after which it began to recover and had almost come to December 1968 value in April 1971, and crossed it in November 1972. So I think the above statement by Dr. Wang that the capital markets may have been closed for 'next eight years' may be an exaggeration with the real period when the stock market was down and so capital markets not being good in those times, perhaps being closer to four years.

I searched the Internet for Go-Go years and came across a couple of interesting articles, and a very interesting chart: 

As per this article: The Go-Go Sixties, https://www.thinkadvisor.com/2008/04/01/the-go-go-sixties/ , 1st April 2008, the Dow Jones Industrial Average touched a record high of 685.47 on 5th January 1960. But it fell to its lowest point of the 1960s decade - 535.76 - on 26th June 1962. After that low point, it started on an almost constant upward motion for the next few years. In end 1963 it touched 750 and in end 1964 it touched 900! There was a small dip in 1965 after which the rise continued. The high point for the 1960s was on 9th February 1966 when the Dow touched 995.15.

Dow Jones - DJIA - 100 Year Historical Chart, https://www.macrotrends.net/1319/dow-jones-100-year-historical-chart , is a very interesting chart allowing us to see the Dow index trend in 1960s period (as well as other decades from 1915 to June 2021 (as of 30th July 2021)). By default it shows inflation adjusted values of the index but by unchecking the 'Inflation-Adjusted' checkbox at the top of the chart, one can see the non inflation-adjusted (actual) values. You can also use click-and-drag to zoom into the chart and, for example, see only the 1960s chart. The chart shows an almost constant rise from Jun 1962 to Jan 1966, which agrees with the data provided in the above 'The Go-Go Sixties' article. The chart gives monthly figures which I guess would be the monthly average. It shows a dip from Jan. 1966 index value of 983.51 to 774.22 in Sep. 1966, but goes up in a zig-zag way to 901.29 in Aug. 1967 when Wang Labs. went public.

As per 'The Go-Go Sixties' article, the Dow closed at 985.21 on 3rd Dec. 1968. Then there was a downward trend. The above mentioned 100 year historical chart shows the decline as short-term peak of 985.08 in Nov. 1968 going down almost constantly over a period of around one and a half years to 683.53 in Jun. 1970. Then the market moved mostly up over next months to 941.75 in Apr. 1971. A dip followed by an upward trend led to the index touching, for the first time, the 4 figure mark of 1018.21 for month of Nov. 1972.

The 'Go-Go Sixties' article tells us, "Technology stocks enjoyed a new popularity, with hot money chasing after the likes of Polaroid, Telex, Control Data, Teledyne, Texas Instruments, University Computing and Itek."

Another interesting article in this context is: The End of the Go-Go Years, https://awealthofcommonsense.com/2017/09/the-end-of-the-go-go-years/ , 24th Sept. 2017. It has an extract from the book, The Go-Go Years by John Brooks,  https://www.amazon.com/Go-Go-Years-Crashing-Streets-Bullish-ebook/dp/B00MAEVRAQ . As per the article, John Brooks writes, "From the September 1929 peak to the nadir of the Great Depression in the summer of 1932, the Dow industrial average dropped from 381 to 36, or just over 90 percent. From the December 1968 peak to the May 1970 bottom, the same index dropped from 985 to 631, or about 36 percent."

But it was technology and computer stocks that took the major part of the beating with their decline being far greater than the average 36 percent. As per the article, John Brooks writes, "[A financial consultant called Max] Shapiro made a list of thirty leading glamour stocks of the nineteen sixties — ten leading conglomerates including Litton, Gulf and Western, and Ling-Temco-Vaught, ten computer stocks including IBM, Leasco, and Sperry Rand, and ten technology stocks including Polaroid, Xerox, and Fairchild Camera. The average 1969-1970 decline of the ten conglomerates, Shapiro found, had been 86 percent; of the computer stocks, 80 percent; of the technology stocks, 77 percent. The average decline of all thirty stocks in this handmade neo-Dow had been 81 percent." 

These 'glamour stocks' including technology and computer stocks were the ones in which the novice investor would have tried his/her luck. As per the article, Brooks writes, "Even allowing for the fact that the advantage of hindsight gave Shapiro the opportunity to choose for inclusion in his list particular stocks that would help prove his point, his analysis strongly suggests that, as measured by the performance of the stocks in which the novice investor was most likely to make his first plunges, the 1969-1970 crash was fully comparable to that of 1929."

Ravi: Hmm. There is so much of risk involved in top-level decision making during rapid growth stages of a company with market timing and luck playing a significant role in success or failure. Capital is vital for rapid growth of a company. But getting capital via public issue of stock involves taking risks and sensing the right market timing as well. I think that understanding capital markets requires quite a different set of skills from understanding computer hardware or software design & development, and even the associated business sector of computer hardware and software. At the time of the public issue, Dr. Wang may have been quite dependent on advice he got from his bankers and financial consultants he used for the public issue, and seems to have got good advice from them.

Having covered this general background of the times - Go-Go 1960s - when Wang Labs. went public, we can now get into some details of it. Wang writes in Lessons that 1967 was a year of very rapid growth of calculators sales for the company. $4.25 million worth of sales of calculators was done in fiscal 1967 which was 8 times calculator sales of previous year. Anticipating this demand, Wang company had doubled its employees to 400, and expanded its Tewksbury facility by around 150 percent. He writes, "It is a fact of life of business that you have to spend money for staffing and building before you reap the rewards of increased sales, even if people are begging to buy your products."

Repeated short-term loans from their bankers, First National Bank of Boston, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BankBoston#First_National_Bank_of_Boston , led to Wang Labs. total borrowings from this bank crossing 1 million dollars by early 1967. At that time, Wang Labs. net worth was around that figure of 1 million dollars! Mr. Earnest Stockwell who was the bank official Wang interacted with, got "a little nervous" with the size of Wang Labs. borrowing. Wang writes that Stockwell suggested to Wang that: "we (Wang Labs) go public as a means of raising capital so that we might reduce our debt burden."

For Dr. Wang, the key concern was whether public issue would further dilute his family control of the company, which had already been diluted by 25 percent with the Warner & Swasey investment in Wang Labs. (in 1959). Wang gives some very interesting views of why he wanted to have control of his company. He writes, "One of the reasons I founded Wang Laboratories was that I like to take my own risks. So long as I am in control, I have a stake in whether I'm right or wrong." He explains that it is not that he does not value others' opinions. He writes that he gives great importance to them, both from within the company and from outside. He further explains that it does not mean that he does not "feel responsible for the well-being of those who are affected by the fortunes of the company." It is just that he wants to be the "final authority" on matters related to "destiny" of the company he founded.

Dr. Wang's view is that if he as CEO were answerable to "outside directors" then he, as CEO, would have had to focus on quarterly performance and not so much on long-term interests. Having control of his company, allowed him to focus on long-term interests of the company.

Wang writes that having control of the company, allowed CEO Wang to act decisively and quickly when faced with strategically important issues. He adds, "Later in my career, there were a number of instances in which I was able to make such crucial decisions quickly, precisely because I had both the responsibility and the power to do so."

It is for these reasons that Wang was not keen on venture capital.

Wang also covers the downside of "a CEO answerable to no one but himself" but argues that the free market would limit such damage, as employees and customers are free to move elsewhere if the company is doing badly due to an incompetent or irrational CEO. This brings in a "self-corrective" aspect to "corporate endeavour".

Wang writes, "When I founded Wang Laboratories, my goal was for the company to serve its community and its customers, both through technology and through the positive economic dividends of its growth." Wang felt that he can best ensure that the company was working towards these goals by having control of the company's policies.

Wang writes that "Today" which is 1986 when the book was written/published, "there are innumerable stories about founders of high-tech firms who find themselves ousted by dissatisfied shareholders. The question of whether or not these founders should be removed for the good of the company is moot, but it is certain that once a founder loses control of his company, he can no longer direct the company toward whatever goal he set for it."

Wang gives his views on family involvement aspect of "family control" of the company. He writes that he would like to have enough control to give his children the chance to demonstrate that they can successfully run the company. Wang also writes that he does not "rule out the possibility that a professional manager might prove to be the best steward of the company's future".

Wang writes that "Today" (1986), both his sons work for Wang Laboratories and his only daughter is still in college. He writes that his elder son, Fred Wang, is executive vice-president after having worked in various divisions of the company, and his younger son, Courtney Wang is running a semiautonomous division of the company. He writes that it is his children's obligation, not privilege, to show their management skills.

Wang writes, ".. I have tried to educate my children as to my style of management, which is to lead by example rather than to dictate, and to leave room for individual initiative rather than to spell out every step of how a job is accomplished." He continues, "While I hope they (Wang's children) succeed ultimately, the continued ability of Wang Laboratories to grow and serve its community is more important to me than who controls it after I retire."

The investment banking firm that Wang consulted with, told Wang that he could raise money to retire short-term debt of the company, without diluting Wang family's stock holdings so much as to lose control of the company. That seems to have addressed Wang's concerns about going public.

Ravi: At the time the book was published (1986), Wang Laboratories may have not yet got into a serious decline stage. At least, till end of Chapter 9 'Going Public', the book does not give that impression. Perhaps the serious decline started a year or two after 1986. I felt it appropriate at this stage to share an extract from 'Decline and fall' section of Wang Laboratories wiki page, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Laboratories#Decline_and_fall :

Wang Labs would be only one of a large number of New England-based computer companies that would falter in the late 1980s and 1990s, marking the end of the Massachusetts Miracle. 

An Wang's insistence that his son, Fred Wang, succeed him contributed to the company's failure. Fred Wang was a business school graduate, "but by almost any definition", wrote Charles C. Kenney, "unsuited for the job in which his father had placed him". His assignment, first as head of research and development, then as president of the company, led to resignations by key R&D and business personnel. Amid declining revenues, John F. Cunningham, an 18-year employee of the firm, resigned as President and COO of Wang Labs to become chairman and chief executive of Computer Consoles Inc. Cunningham resigned due to disagreement with An Wang on how to pull the company out of the slump, as well as being upset that Fred Wang was positioned as the successor, an instance of nepotism.[56][57]

One turning point occurred when Fred Wang was head of R&D. On October 4, 1983, Wang Laboratories announced fourteen major hardware and software products, and promised dates of delivery. The announcement was well received, but even at the time there were warning signs. According to Datamation, Wang announced "everything but the kitchen sink. And if you could attach the kitchen sink to a personal computer they would announce that too."[58] Very few of the products were close to completion and many of them had not even been started. All were delivered late and some were never delivered at all. In retrospect this was referred to as the "vaporware announcement" and it hurt the credibility of Fred Wang and Wang Laboratories.

In 1986, Fred Wang, then 36 years old, was installed as president of Wang Laboratories. However, the company's fortunes continued to decline. Unlike most computer companies that funded their growth by issuing stock, An Wang had used debt to avoid further dilution of family control of the company. By August 1989, that debt was causing conflicts with its creditors. On August 4, 1989, An Wang fired his son. Richard W. Miller replaced him as the president of Wang Laboratories, having been with the company since 1988.[57]

Miller announced in December 1989 that the company would start to embrace established software standards, rather than use traditional proprietary designs. An Wang died in March 1990, and Miller took on the additional posts of Chairman and CEO. The company underwent massive restructuring, and in August 1990, it eliminated its bank debt, but still ended the year with a record net loss.[57]

[References:]

56. Day, Kathleen (1985-07-20). "Cunningham Resigns as Wang President"

57. "History of WANG LABORATORIES, INC. – FundingUniverse" http://www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/wang-laboratories-inc-history/ . Fundinguniverse.com. Retrieved 2016-05-20.

58. Stein, Charles (1986): "A High-Tech David Faltered as Goliath," The Boston Globe, November 27, 1989, Business section, p. 1: "if you could attach the kitchen sink, they would announce that too ..."

--- end extract from Wang Laboratories wiki page ---

Wang writes that one of the programs the company had developed for the calculator, enabled bond traders to compute the present value of bonds. Earlier on, the traders were dependent on tables for this calculation, and these tables did not cover the higher interest rates of 8 and 9 percent that the market saw in those times. But Wang's calculator and this application program developed for this need, enabled bond traders to "discount bonds for any time period with any interest rate". This led to Wang's calculators become well known on Wall Street.

Wang mentions that a trader at Salomon Brothers, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salomon_Brothers ,  who had bought Wang's calculator, saw a difference in value that the bond trading program on Wang's calculator gave from the value given using the tables used by Salomon Brothers, for one particular set of numbers. Wang writes, "Salomon Brothers got in touch with us and asked us to check out the calculation. We did, and felt sure that our calculation was accurate." Salomon Brothers then got an independent mathematician to check the results and the mathematician's result was the number given by Wang's calculator and program, indicating that for this particular set of numbers, the tables used by Salomon Brothers (for thirty years) was inaccurate! This matter became known among the traders and that enhanced the credibility of Wang Laboratories among the very persons who would later be trading the stock! 

Wang provides details of how the type and number of shares of the company had to be changed before going public so as to have suitably large number of shares for a publicly traded company. This included a "nineteen-to-one split" in May 1967, and distribution of slightly over 700,000 new shares to shareholders in July. Eventually the number of shares of Wang Laboratories was around 1.5 million, before it went public.

Wang writes that it was expected that Wang stock owners would "reap a windfall" when Wang Laboratories went public. Wang writes that directors and "a number of" senior engineers and managers who had played a major role in growth of Wang Laboratories were provided stock options before the first split, as he felt that they should benefit from the event. Later Wang extended the stock option to "many" junior employees. Wang writes, "We ended up granting employees options for 20,423 shares at a cost of $4.17 a share." He also arranged for employees to be able to buy some number of shares at the issuing price.

Wang explains the calculation of the IPO issuing share price. As the company now had a total of around 1.5 million shares, the earnings per share came to around $.50 per share. The consulting company for the public issue felt that 25 times the earnings per share was the maximum acceptable price, given the market conditions then. So the Wang Laboratories IPO (Initial Public Offering) share price was $12.50 per share.

Initially, the plan was to offer 200,000 shares to the public which would, (if fully subscribed, I presume, going by how such public issues are done in India), raise $2.5 million and which was more than the short-term debt of Wang Laboratories. Wang's family would still have 65 percent of the shares and so be in control of the company. But as the preliminary subscription was very successful, the managers of the public issue convinced Wang to increase the public offering to 240,000 shares.

There was a final stumbling block which was that the SEC (Securities & Exchange Commission) approval was being delayed as they could not understand what the company did. It needed a visit from one of Wang's lawyers who went with a salesman and a calculator to demonstrate the calculator to the SEC, to get the approval.

As it became known that Wang Laboratories was going public, Dr. Wang's secretary was flooded with calls about how to get Wang stock at offering price. She advised the callers to contact their stockbrokers. But one caller threatened to have her fired if she did not provide him Wang stock at the issue price!

Wang writes that in this period when Marty Miller went to a barbershop for a haircut, all the talk in the barbershop was about how to get Wang shares. Miller chose not to reveal his Wang employee identity to avoid being flooded with requests!


Above pic having Wang Laboratories IPO announcement and a Boston Globe article of the successful IPO, is courtesy Lessons by An Wang book. To fit in the standard width of the blog post, I chose to show a compressed version of the pic by default. To open pic in larger resolution (on PC desktop) at which resolution the Boston Globe article is readable, right-click on pic followed by open link (NOT image) in new tab/window. In new tab/window you may have to click on pic to zoom in.

The first public trade of Wang stock was on August 23rd 1967 and it was at $38 per share which was over 3 times the issue price. At the end of that day, the stock closed at $40.50.

From a net 1 million dollars worth before the IPO, Wang Labs got transformed into a company with market capitalization of about 70 million dollars after the IPO.

An Wang and his family's shares of Wang Labs were now worth about 50 million dollars. Many employees who had bought Wang shares through stock options (or, one presumes, even at issue price) were very happy with the appreciation. Wang writes, 'There was jubilation in the offices. I remember hearing my secretary, who had exercised an option to buy a hundred shares, shout, "I'm rich, I'm rich!" A number of the employees did make a good deal of money, even if they did not become rich.' Marty Miller was able to buy his first house using his stock options.

As Wang stock price continued to rise in the short-term, Warner & Swasey wanted to sell some of their shares. The Wang Family Trust management also felt that some of its Wang shares should be sold. So a secondary offering was made in (or around) May 1968, selling 130,000 Wang shares at price of $67 per share. 

Wang writes, "At the time this book goes to press (Ravi: 1986), Wang stock is selling at $20 per share, which, adjusted for splits, is still about twelve times the $67 per share the stock brought in 1968."

Wang writes in Lessons book that since he had been warned about possible discrimination due to his company having his Chinese name, the demand for his company's stock was pleasing as it showed the respect his company with a Chinese name, had with the business community. 

Ravi: Some of the key milestones and features of the Wang Laboratories journey from its founding till its IPO are:
  1. Wang Laboratories is founded as sole proprietorship by Dr. An Wang in June 1951 with 600 dollars capital and operating out of a 200 sq. feet rented office in Boston costing 70 dollars a month
  2. Lot of consulting work in the initial years which was the major source of revenue though memory cores and some digital devices Dr. Wang invented were also sold
  3. First infusion of significant money into the company through part of proceeds of patent sale to IBM in 1956 ($400,000 minus, I presume, expenses like lawyer's fees)
  4. Sub-contracted work for design & development of digital equipment, manufacture and sales of less well-known products like Logi-blocs and Weditrol
  5. Another significant cash infusion through sale to Warner & Swasey of 25% of company in 1959 for $50,000 + loan of $100,000
  6. Linasec sub-contracted work involving design & development of a special purpose computer to prepare justified punched tape to drive linotype typesetting machines in 1963-65
  7. Wang Labs move from Natick to an 85 acre site in Tewksbury, Massachusetts, employing 35 people in 1964
  8. Design, development and sales of LOCI products in 1965-66 with LOCI-2 making Wang Labs an established manufacturer and seller of (hi-tech) digital equipment
  9. Great success of Wang 300 series calculators resulting in 400 people being employed by Wang Labs in 1967 with a sales and service network in 40 cities in USA as well as in a few foreign countries
  10. Successful IPO in August 1967

With the successful IPO in 1967, Wang Laboratories could be said to have well and truly arrived as a manufacturer of (hi-tech) digital equipment. LOCI-2 in 1965 followed by Wang 300 series calculators in 1965 and later years, made Wang a well known in its sector, manufacturer and seller of its own designed and manufactured digital equipment. So I think 1965 and then 1967 (IPO year) can be viewed as watershed years for Wang Labs. It took 14 years for Wang Labs founded in 1951, to establish itself as a manufacturer and seller of (hi-tech) digital equipment, and 16 years to have a successful IPO.

I think even by end of 1967, An Wang had already had a fascinating journey as a Chinese-American engineering graduate and world war 2 radio equipment assembler from Shanghai who arrived in USA without much money in 1945 (and was supported initially by Chinese nationalist government). In 22 years, given his background when arriving in the USA, An Wang had already achieved extraordinary success by acquiring a PhD in applied physics from Harvard, contributing to magnetic-core memory invention including having a patent for his contribution, and establishing the company he founded, Wang Labs, as a noted manufacturer and seller of hi-tech digital electronics equipment, followed by a successful IPO of Wang Labs. Success not only in his technical field of digital electronics but also as a business entrepreneur starting from scratch in a foreign land! But there was much more to come in later decades!

Not only did An Wang become rich individually (his family holdings in Wang Labs was worth 50 million dollars after IPO in 1967), his Wang Labs company employed many American citizens giving them a livelihood. I am quite sure a good number, if not a majority, of these employees would have been non-Chinese background Americans. Thus even by 1967, he seems to have significantly contributed to better (material) life for non-Chinese background Americans who were employees of his company. His company's products would have helped many American customers (or customer-company employees) to do their work in a better and more efficient way, which is why they were buying his company's products. What a wonderful way to give back to the once-foreign country that allowed him & his wife to stay, grow in career & earnings, raise a family, become its citizens and become very prosperous (multi-millionaires by 1967)! 

I think An Wang's achievements were made possible, in significant part, due to him going to USA and settling down there. If he had either stayed on in Shanghai after World War 2 and as Shanghai along with whole of mainland China came under communist rule from 1949, or even if he had migrated to Taiwan (with other nationalists), I doubt he would have been able to achieve so much in the fields of digital electronics and computers. So credit has to be given to post World War II USA in general and, in particular, the state of Massachusetts where An Wang did his Masters & PhD studies as well as his research and later business entrepreneurship through main facilities and headquarters of Wang Laboratories, for having provided the environment for a well qualified Chinese immigrant like An Wang to grow and flourish in the hi-tech digital electronics field. 


Wang Labs' first attempts at making general purpose computer products: Wang 4000, an 'IBM-like' computer project which changed into Wang 700 calculator to meet competitive threat, and Wang 3300 BASIC (late 1960s to early 1970s)

Wang writes in Lessons that even as Wang was being identified as a calculator company, due to new technologies (like LSI semiconductors), he "could see the day when the desk-top calculator would become a commodity, a point when the advantage would go to the low-cost producer." The profit-margin would then be very thin and so Wang started looking at other opportunities, even as the company was expanding its line of low-cost calculators which were then in demand.

One such opportunity was development of a general-purpose computer. In 1951 when Wang Labs. was founded, Dr. Wang did not consider such a project due to huge costs it entailed. But things had changed by late 1967. 

Dr. Wang gives an interesting account of the developments in computers from the time he was working in Harvard Computation Laboratory (1948 to 1951) to late 1960s (late 1967). Wang writes, "In the beginning, if you wanted to get a computer to do something different, you changed its wiring. The advent of stored programs allowed you to change the operations of the computer by changing the instructions in a program." 

It was fascinating for me, a guy who got into software development in 1984 on Wang computers, and worked mostly in high-level programming languages like C/C++, PL/1, COBOL and BASIC while working on Wang computers (till 1990), to read the above statements of Dr. Wang, as he worked on computers in the Harvard Computation Laboratory during the times (1948 to 1951) when one changed the wiring of the computer, if one wanted the computer to do something different! I mean, it is a computer history statement from a person who had direct experience of development and usage of computers in those days of late 1940s and early 1950s.

Dr. Wang writes that initial programs were written in machine language. He writes, "As memory increased, people began to devise languages such as FORTRAN, ALGOL, and COBOL, which had more in common with the notation of logic and statistics." .. "The user would write a program in one of these languages which in turn would be translated into machine language statements tailored to the hardware of a particular computer." This made it easier for scientists and professionals to write programs for the computer.

Then came BASIC language in 1965. Wang writes, "BASIC took the concept of high-level languages one step further than FORTRAN or COBOL. It was a language so simple that in a matter of hours novices could learn how to tell a computer to perform simple chores."

The advent of BASIC led to Dr. Wang consider developing general-purpose computers. Wang writes, "BASIC radically reduced the effort required to customize programs for a user's specific needs. I felt that the time had come for us to consider making such a general-purpose computer."

Dr. Wang viewed DEC's PDP-8 as the general-purpose computer that Wang's general-purpose computer would compete with. Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC),  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Equipment_Corporation , based in Maynard, Massachusetts, the same US state where Wang was based, introduced a general-purpose computer (minicomputer) model PDP-8 (aka Straight-8) in 1965 priced at $18,500. Some relevant extracts from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PDP-8 are given below:

It used diode–transistor logic packaged on flip chip cards in a machine about the size of a small household refrigerator.

...

The Straight-8 was supplanted in 1966 by the PDP-8/S, which was available in desktop and rack-mount models. Using a one-bit serial arithmetic logic unit (ALU) allowed the PDP-8/S to be smaller and less expensive, although slower than the original PDP-8. A basic 8/S sold for under $10,000, the first machine to reach that milestone.[4][7]

... 

The PDP-8 combines low cost,[2] simplicity, expandability, and careful engineering for value. The greatest historical significance was that the PDP-8's low cost and high volume made a computer available to many new customers for many new uses. Its continuing significance is as a historical example of value-engineered [9] computer design.

[Wiki References:]

2. Douglas W. Jones. "The Digital Equipment Corporation PDP-8 -- Frequently Asked Questions".

4. Schein, Edgar H. (2004). DEC is dead, long live DEC: the lasting legacy of Digital Equipment Corporation. San Francisco, Calif.: Berrett-Koehler Publishers. p. 271. ISBN 1576753050.

7. The Rhode Island Computer Museum. "Digital Equipment PDP-8/S, S/N 517".

9. Small Computer Handbook, NEW PDP 8/I edition (Forward). Digital Equipment Corporation. 1968.

--- end PDP-8 wiki extracts ---

Given below are extracts from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minicomputer :

The definition of minicomputer is vague with the consequence that there are a number of candidates for the first minicomputer, ranging from the CDC 160 circa 1960 to the DEC PDP-8 circa 1965.[11] An early and highly successful minicomputer was Digital Equipment Corporation's (DEC) 12-bit PDP-8, which was built using discrete transistors and cost from US$16,000 upwards when launched in 1964. Later versions of the PDP-8 took advantage of small-scale integrated circuits. The important precursors of the PDP-8 include the PDP-5, LINC,[12] the TX-0, the TX-2, and the PDP-1. DEC gave rise to a number of minicomputer companies along Massachusetts Route 128, including Data General, Wang Laboratories, Apollo Computer, and Prime Computer."

[Wiki References:]

11. Lafferty, Stephen H. (January 2014). "Who Built The First Minicomputers?". Retrieved 24 January 2014.

12. "The LINC: An Early "Personal Computer"". DrDobbs.com.

--- end Minicomputer wiki extracts --- 

As per Lessons book, in late 1967 Frank Trantanella suggested to Dr. Wang that they could develop a small computer using CPU of Wang's more sophisticated calculators and magnetic cassette storage device which Wang was already using to store programs in their calculators. This was the Wang 4000 which got shown to Dr. Wang in the spring of 1968 but which Dr. Wang felt could not compete with PDP-8.

Wang writes, "Frank Trantanella did not agree with my assessment that the 4000 was inadequate, and ultimately he left the company." Trantanella later founded his own company which made point-of-sale terminals.

Some additional info on Wang 4000 from http://www.thebattles.net/wang4000/ : The "first programmable computer system" (which I think can be viewed as the first general-purpose computer) created by Wang Laboratories was the Wang 4000 in 1966 but perhaps introduced in the market only in 1967. An article on it titled, 'Components "talk" to each other through computer's "busline"' was published in Product Engineering magazine of McGraw-Hill issue dated 27th April 1967. The article states, "In all likelihood, for logarithmic operations, the 4000 provides the fastest computing speed of all general-purpose computers now available" ... "Introduced at the recent meeting of the IEEE in New York, the 4000 has been purchased for a variety of applications. Most of them are in manufacturing or processing plants where the computer's capability for acquiring and processing data at a number of control points in a system can be utilized. These include automatic process control, recording of processing data, generation of control, or data-processing programs for plant operations ranging from bookkeeping to the development of new production methods." 

After Dr. Wang's assessment that Wang 4000 computer was not adequate to compete with DEC's PDP-8, he realized that he "would have to look outside the company for the expertise needed to design the computer and other sophisticated systems I (Dr. Wang) wanted to build".

Wang writes further, "One skill we needed was programming expertise." Wang company had hardware expertise and at writing application programs for their calculators but did not have programming expertise to link their calculators to mainframe computers. Wang writes, "Nor did we have the software expertise needed to write the operating system for a computer we might design."

Ravi: I think those are important observations of Dr. Wang about Wang company then. Dr. Wang himself was strong in hardware. He was the key brain behind the logarithm generator digital electronics part of the Wang calculators which led to these calculators being low-cost and a success in the market. But when it came to developing a general-purpose computer, software played a significant role and that is where it seems that Dr. Wang himself was not very conversant. I mean, so far in the Lessons book, I have not read about Dr. Wang claiming to have written a software program himself, whereas he has claimed to have designed so many digital circuits including the logarithm generator part of Wang calculators.

So now Dr. Wang had to play more of the manager role in assessing whether his staff had the programming expertise to develop the software part of a general-purpose computer that would be competitive in the market. And his assessment was that his staff did NOT have that programming expertise.

Wang's approach to acquire the requisite programming expertise to develop a general-purpose computer was to consider acquiring or having a joint venture with a company that had such expertise. This thinking seems to have been made possible only because of Wang's successful IPO in 1967! In April 1968, Wang informed Peter Brooke who was the bank officer who had suggested to Wang to have an alliance with Warner & Swasey (in 1959), who later became a venture capitalist and was on the board of Wang Laboratories, about this matter. Brooke suggested Philip Hankins Incorporated (PHI) based in Watertown, Massachusetts which was well known for its software expertise and also had a rented IBM 360/50 computer.

It was felt that both companies would benefit if they got together. From Wang company's perspective, besides the programming expertise of PHI, access to the IBM 360 mainframe would allow Wang to run simulations of computer designs. In June 1968, Wang Laboratories acquired PHI by giving them around 100,000 shares of Wang stock (roughly 5 percent of Wang company's outstanding shares). Wang shares were selling then at around $73 per share.

Wang writes that this deal made top people at PHI relatively wealthy which contributed to many of them leaving the company in a year's time! Some may have not fit into the new company and so decided to leave but the money they made with the deal, enabled them to easily consider leaving! This irritated Dr. Wang. He writes that this experience ".. taught me the lesson that if you enter into a relationship with a company whose principal asset is people, you should do so in a way that does not remove all incentives for those people to continue working."

On the plus side, the next tiers of PHI below the top people had strong analysts, programmers and managers who were able to fill the positions of the senior people who had left. That made the PHI acquisition, as per Dr. Wang, "well worth its cost".

In late summer of 1968, Wang Labs. initiated two projects to develop a general-purpose computer. One was the 3300 BASIC, and the other was an IBM-like computer, which was later changed into 700 an advanced programming calculator to meet the challenge of Hewlett-Packard's 9100 calculator. Wang writes that both these projects helped the company learn more about designing computers. The Wang 3300 BASIC did not do well but seems to have paved the way for the successful Wang 2200 computers. But the Wang 700 was very successful.

As per http://wang3300.org/ the IBM mainframe that PHI had (rented), which now was acquired by Wang company "played an important role in the development of the 3300." Also the website states that the IBM mainframe machine was IBM 360/65 (while Lessons book mentions IBM 360/50).

Extracts about the IBM 360 series from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_System/360 :

The IBM System/360 (S/360) is a family of mainframe computer systems that was announced by IBM on April 7, 1964, and delivered between 1965 and 1978.[1] It was the first family of computers designed to cover the complete range of applications, from small to large, both commercial and scientific. The design made a clear distinction between architecture and implementation, allowing IBM to release a suite of compatible designs at different prices. All but the only partially compatible Model 44 and the most expensive systems use microcode to implement the instruction set, which features 8-bit byte addressing and binary, decimal and hexadecimal floating-point calculations.

...

The IBM 360 was extremely successful in the market, allowing customers to purchase a smaller system with the knowledge they would always be able to migrate upward if their needs grew, without reprogramming of application software or replacing peripheral devices. Many consider the design one of the most successful computers in history, influencing computer design for years to come.

[Wiki References:]

1. "IBM System/360 Dates and Characteristics". IBM. 2003-01-23.

--- end IBM System 360 wiki extracts ---

Wang 700 Advanced Programming Calculator 

Wang writes, "Through the use of microprogramming, we saw an opportunity to design a machine that could compete effectively against both the DEC machines and the mainframes." By mainframes, Wang seems to be referring to computers like the IBM 360 product line.

Dr. Wang explains microprogramming as follows: "The word microprogramming refers to a program that is wired onto a circuit board (or a semiconductor chip) and which organizes the basic operations of a computer into more sophisticated functions." He adds that the microprogram is typically in ROM and that it "stands between a software program and a machine". Dr. Wang writes that using microprogramming approach reduced expensive internal storage needs.

The Microcode wiki page, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microcode , explains these terms well. The microprogram is also referred to as microcode.

The earlier Wang calculator models used microprogramming but the microprogramming needed for the new, then unnamed, general-purpose computer, was far more complex. In 1968 summer, a competition was held on microprogramming an instruction of the new computer with least amount of code, whose winner was Harold Koplow, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Koplow , who had joined Wang as a "calculator development engineer". Koplow was then tasked with writing microcode for the new computer (referred to by Dr. Wang as their IBM-like computer).

Hewlett-Packard's (HP) announcement of the HP 9100 series of calculators,  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hewlett-Packard_9100A , changed the plan for the new Wang computer! This HP 9100 calculators had features like a CRT display showing 3 lines of mathematical operations and ability to be programmed via keyboard or through magnetic cards, which resulted in badly hurting sales of Wang's 370/380 calculators (perhaps Wang's top calculator models then).

This competitive threat had to be addressed. So the team working on the IBM-like computer was redirected! Wang writes, "Although its architecture was still based on the IBM 360, we changed its specifications so that it would become a computer dedicated to scientific calculations. We also directly addressed the capabilities of the Hewlett-Packard calculator."

So the IBM-like computer project became the Wang 700 calculator product line.

The HP 9100 calculator was already out in the market while Wang's 700 calculator was still being developed! Wang company did not want to lose customers to HP in the period it took for the 700 calculator to ship. Dr. Wang writes, "We took a gamble anyway and announced the machine in December 1968, promising to ship the machines in June 1969." 

Ravi: Hmm. Vaporware announcements! I wonder how much pressure the team that was developing the 700 came under.

Orders were taken for the Wang 700 calculator with customers being provided other Wang calculators till the 700 was ready.

The product was not ready to ship in June 1969 and customers got restless! A prototype of the yet-to-be miniaturized product was demonstrated in a trade show to customers by Harold Koplow. Once miniaturization was achieved, the next problem was overheating as the development team were resisting using a fan due to the noise it would create.

Salesman demonstrating the prototype (after miniaturization) would demonstrate the prototype and when they noticed it was starting to overheat, they would tell the demo viewers that they will now show the inside of the product and then remove the cover, allowing it to cool off!

Eventually they decided to have a fan in the product and accept the little noise that came with it. Then the product began to be shipped.

Wang writes, "The 700 series became a very successful product."

Dr. Wang writes that after the 700 product started getting used by customers, they (Wang company) noted that "people were using the 700 to write programs, even though the machine was not really designed for general-purpose programming". The number of applications written for the 700 saw a great increase! Dr. Wang and others at Wang company got convinced "that there was a market for inexpensive general-purpose computers". Wang writes, "The reason people would put up with the inconvenience of programming on a calculator with a tube display was that the machine was so much cheaper than the general-purpose computers available at the time."

Ravi: It is fascinating to see how Dr. Wang and others were learning about the demand for inexpensive general-purpose computers though usage of their 700 calculator products which had only numerical nixie tube display (two rows) and not a CRT display, to write application programs.

The product made it to the National Museum of American History: Wang 700 Electronic Calculator,  https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/nmah_334351 .

Above pic: Wang 700C Desktop Electronic (Advanced Programming) Calculator. Pic courtesy: https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/nmah_334351 .

Wang writes, "Had we wanted to, we could have marketed the 700 as a computer." But they did not do so, as it was easier to sell a calculator than selling a computer, even if the calculator is expensive. In that time period of late 1960s and early 1970s, computer purchase would typically involve top management in big companies as well as in government, with committees examining the product's compatibility with IBM and the languages it supported, and examining the specifications and requirements. But purchase decisions for calculators were made at lower level and done more quickly.

https://www.oldcalculatormuseum.com/wang720.html gives details of one of the models of that series.

Here are a couple of videos of Wang 700 series calculators:

Wang 700 series Calculator Loading and Executing a Program to Compute Cubic Root Newton-Raphson, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wYwChiHVTHo , 57 secs.

Wang 700 series 720C Nixie Tube Calculator, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Kh9Eu8fZHc , 5 min. 17 secs.

The WANG desktop calculators (1966-1978),  http://home.wxs.nl/~janvdv/wang/wangmuseum700.htm has a very interesting account of the writer of the webpage, Jan van de Veen, using and programming the Wang 720C calculator in the 1970s! He writes that the institute he was working with bought a Wang 720C calculator and a program to do Multiple Regression Analyses in 1972. He gives an example of a program for the calculator. The page also has a picture of the Wang 720C used by the institute he was working with, taken in April 1973 (link for the pic itself: http://home.wxs.nl/~janvdv/images/720c.jpg )!

Another interesting link is: Wang 700 Programmable Calculator Simulator,  http://wang700.durgadas.com/ . I have not checked out the simulator but the website has details about programming the calculator.

Wang writes that the 700 series was the last successful product of Wang Labs. to use magnetic core memory. Intel started selling a semiconductor chip holding two thousand bits of memory, which Wang used in a new line of 600 calculator series products aimed at business users.

Wang 3300 BASIC computer

While the Wang 3300 hardware was being done, the IBM 360/65 mainframe was used to simulate the Wang 3300 and software for the Wang 3300 was developed using the simulator! As per https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Laboratories#Wang_3300 , the Wang 3300 was announced in Feb. 1969 and the first product was shipped in March 1971.

Dave Moros, an engineer from PHI, which was acquired by Wang, wrote the BASIC interpreter for the Wang 3300.

http://wang3300.org/docs/3300ComputerReferenceManual.700-0365.10-71.pdf is the reference manual (56 pages) for the Wang 3300. The Introduction section on Page 6 states, "The Wang 3300 is an integrated circuit general purpose mini computer. Unlike most computers in this class, it was specifically designed to be the central processor for multi-terminal time-sharing applications for higher level language systems". It mentions the 68 instructions supported by the machine (manual goes into details of all these instructions), I/O bus structure to handle up to 128 I/O devices with Direct Memory Access facility, interrupt handling mechanism (128 priority interrupt levels), memory up to 65K etc. 

The Introduction section states, "The Wang 3300 is a byte-oriented computer, but it also has a number of double byte operand memory reference commands. This in essence provides the best features of both 8 bit and 16 bit computers." It goes on to say that the design enables "the 3300 to meet a great variety of scientific and commercial applications in the both [Ravi: should be both the, I think] real-time and batch processing modes."

http://wang3300.org/docs/3300press.1970.pdf shows some press clippings about Wang 3300. The first page is an advertisement of Wang 3300. It has a pic of the Wang 3300 CPU (having text "WANG 3300 BASIC") in the centre with 7 persons on connected terminals in a circle around it - see below pic.


The main caption is "low cost group therapy".

Additional text is:

WANG'S NEW 3300

The FIRST "BASIC" 

TimeSharingSystem

Under $20,000

-----------------

The 3300 is a time sharing mini-computer system for only 1/4 the cost of subscription services or other in-house time sharing systems. That, in itself, is very therapeutic.

And any anxieties about communicating with a computer can be eliminated by BASIC. The popular conversational language, ideal for beginners and experts alike. It's simple to get involved with a 3300. Begin a system with just one terminal if you like. Then add hardware as needed to accommodate up to 16 users, or to broaden system capability. It's truly

mind expanding.

========= end main text of advertisement ==========

http://wang3300.org/ informs us that Wang 3300 had a BASIC interpreter, an assembler and a loader. The reference manual gives an example of an assembly language program. For interacting with the user, a modified IBM Selectric typewriter or a Teletype terminal was used. There was no video CRT (Cathode Ray Tube) display. Magnetic tape and paper tape peripherals were supported.

Wang 3300 Movie, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiE9AS7c1lY published by Tom Lake on 6th Oct. 2013, shows a Wang 3300 emulator program in operation. Given below is a screenshot from this video which shows how a Wang 3300 CPU front panel looked like.


From this video one can see how the real Wang 3300 would have been used. For communication with the user it uses a teletype terminal. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teletype_Model_33 gives us an idea of how such teletype terminals worked. Given below is a pic of that model from above wiki page:


I think the user in the video is using this teletype terminal model. The video shows the Teletype printing "3300 BASIC READY" and then waiting for user input (via its typewriter). See below screenshot.


Then a punched tape (looks like paper tape) is loaded into the machine initiated by the "LOAD" command typed on the teletype terminal. This takes quite some time (and was a drawback of the machine). Below screenshot shows punched tape being read by the punched tape reader part of the teletype terminal, with the punched tape having a BASIC program that is loaded into the Wang 3300 computer (simulator).


Then the loaded program is listed on the teletype terminal using the "LIST" command. An around 20 lines BASIC program (about resolving vectors) gets printed out. Below screenshot shows the program being listed.


Then the program is run using the "RUN" command. It takes in one input number which is fed by typing it in the teletype terminal. The program then provides the output (printing a few lines; note that the BASIC program itself has some in-built data which is used in addition to the single number that is accepted from the teletype terminal). Below screenshot shows the program output.


Then the video shows the user loading a new 2 line program interactively. He uses the START command which I think clears out the earlier loaded program. As he inputs the first line of the program, he first makes a typing mistake which the BASIC interpreter throws out as a syntax error! He fixes it by typing the line correctly. Then he runs the 2 line program which prints out some calculated number.

Up to 16 users (terminals) could be connected to a single Wang 3300 computer CPU with the computer being used in time-sharing mode.

If I recall correctly, I have done some BASIC programming on Wang VS computers in second half of 1980s. For that time period, this 1971 Wang 3300 seems to have been a fairly functional BASIC interpreter computer serving multiple users through time-sharing! I mean, very clearly the Wang 3300 released in 1971 is a proper 'general purpose' minicomputer product.  While Wang 4000 may have also been a proper minicomputer product, I have not come across videos about it and so I am not sure about how 'general purpose' it was. As a guy who learned programming on a Wang VS80 minicomputer in 1984 (in Datamatics, Mumbai), I have been utterly fascinated to read up and view up on Wang 3300 as one of the first general-purpose minicomputer products produced and sold by Wang, way back in 1971. 

The Wang 3300 did not do well in the market. Some of its drawbacks were slow loading of program through tape and lack of video display terminals.

It seems that video display units (for ASCII character set) started becoming inexpensive and popular as computer terminals (instead of teletype terminal) in mid to late 1970s. 

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VT100 : "DEC's first successful video terminal was the VT50, introduced in 1974 and quickly replaced by the VT52 in 1975. The VT52 featured a text display with 80 columns and 24 rows, bidirectional scrolling, and a custom control language that allowed the cursor to be moved about the screen. These "smart terminals" were a hit due both to their capabilities and to their ability to be run over inexpensive serial links, rather than custom connection as in the case of systems like the IBM 3270, which generally required expensive controllers for distributed applications.

The VT100 was introduced in August 1978, replacing the VT50/VT52 family. Like the earlier models, it communicated with its host system over serial lines at a minimum speed of 50 bit/s, but increased the maximum speed to 19,200 bit/s, double that of the VT52.[2: Digital Equipment Corporation (1979), VT100 Series Technical Manual (PDF), pp. 1–3, retrieved 2015-08-22]"

While the Wang 3300 computer was not a commercial success, it may have paved the way for the Wang 2200 minicomputer which appeared in 1973 and which was a major success. The last page of the Wang 3300 reference manual, http://wang3300.org/docs/3300ComputerReferenceManual.700-0365.10-71.pdf , which seems to be dated October 1971 shows how much Wang had grown internationally by then. The Headquarters are shown to be in Tewksbury, Massachusetts, USA with branch offices in Belgium (Wang Europe, S.A.), England, West Germany, Sweden, Canada, Taiwan, Netherlands and Hong Kong (Kowloon).


Calculators from competitors drive down prices of lower end of Wang calculators; LSI development (calculator-on-a-chip) looms ominously; Dr. Wang decides to move out of calculator business, in stages (1971)

Wang writes that the company sales was about 27 million dollars (per year presumably) and employed 1400 persons by 1970. He writes, "Our earnings remained strong at three million dollars, but the price of calculators was plummeting as competition increased from other companies."

In 1971, the low end of the Wang 300 series calculator models was selling at a low price of $600. The margins for Wang calculator low-end models were getting squeezed thin. 

Dr, Wang felt that the trend indicated that price of the basic calculator would drop to 100 dollars in the not-too-distant future. Wang writes, "Another ominous sign was the imminent appearance of semiconductor chips that contained all the circuits of a calculator - large scale integration. Securities analysts knew about LSI, and they were constantly asking us what we would do to respond to the competitive threat it posed." Wang writes that while the calculator circuits had not yet been put on a semiconductor chip, it was possible to do so and that "someday soon" somebody would accomplish that. At that time, those companies that made large scale integrated circuits, Wang writes, would be in a very strong position in the calculator business. As Wang company was not having semiconductor expertise, it would then be at a serious disadvantage in the calculator business, as per Dr. Wang's view. 

Due to these factors, Dr. Wang wanted the company to get out of the calculator business over time. But at that time, calculators accounted for 70 percent of the company's revenue! Wang decided to "disengage in stages". The low end calculators (300, 200 and 100 series) would not be marketed strongly but the sophisticated calculators (700, 600 and 400 series) would continue to be pushed. The sophisticated calculators did not face the stiff price competition that the low-end calculators faced.

Many of Dr. Wang's company colleagues argued against this decision. Wang writes, "Calculators had turned Wang from an obscure maker of specialized equipment into an internationally recognized company, and it was psychologically impossible for some managers to consider abandoning this market simply because of increased competition."

They argued that they should get suppliers who would enable Wang company to make and sell LSI-based low-cost calculators. But they did not address the main issue that since Wang was not a semiconductor manufacturer, it would not be able to control the cost of a critical part of the calculator, and so lose out to competitors who were semiconductor manufacturers as well.

Wang writes about what happened to Bowmar Instruments Corporation in later years, which "quite likely" would have been Wang company's fate had they continued to focus on calculators as their main business. 

Given below are extracts from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calculator :

The electronic calculators of the mid-1960s were large and heavy desktop machines due to their use of hundreds of transistors on several circuit boards with a large power consumption that required an AC power supply. There were great efforts to put the logic required for a calculator into fewer and fewer integrated circuits (chips) and calculator electronics was one of the leading edges of semiconductor development. U.S. semiconductor manufacturers led the world in large scale integration (LSI) semiconductor development, squeezing more and more functions into individual integrated circuits.  This led to alliances between Japanese calculator manufacturers and U.S. semiconductor companies: Canon Inc. with Texas Instruments, Hayakawa Electric (later renamed Sharp Corporation) with North-American Rockwell Microelectronics (later renamed Rockwell International), Busicom with Mostek and Intel, and General Instrument with Sanyo.

...

The first commercially produced portable calculators appeared in Japan in 1970, and were soon marketed around the world. These included the Sanyo ICC-0081 "Mini Calculator", the Canon Pocketronic, and the Sharp QT-8B "micro Compet". The Canon Pocketronic was a development from the "Cal-Tech" project. It had no traditional display; numerical output was on thermal paper tape.

...

The first American-made pocket-sized calculator, the Bowmar 901B (popularly termed The Bowmar Brain), measuring 5.2 by 3.0 by 1.5 inches (132 mm × 76 mm × 38 mm), came out in the Autumn of 1971, with four functions and an eight-digit red LED display, for $240, while in August 1972 the four-function Sinclair Executive became the first slimline pocket calculator measuring 5.4 by 2.2 by 0.35 inches (137.2 mm × 55.9 mm × 8.9 mm) and weighing 2.5 ounces (71 g). It retailed for around £79 ($194 at the time). By the end of the decade, similar calculators were priced less than £5 ($6.38).

--- end Calculator wiki page extracts ---

Wang writes that shortly after Bowmar introduced its first pocket calculator in 1971, many other companies including Texas Instruments and Hewlett-Packard introduced their own pocket calculators in the market. Wang writes, "My estimation that prices would drop to $100 for a basic calculator turned out to be much too conservative. Within a couple of years, basic pocket calculators cost under $20, and powerful programmable calculators cost under $100." Bowmar could not compete with companies like Texas Instruments who made their own semiconductor chips, and went bankrupt.

Given below are relevant extracts from  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micro_Instrumentation_and_Telemetry_Systems#Price_wars :

Bowmar Instrument Corporation introduced the "Bowmar Brain", a four-function pocket calculator, in September 1971 and the $179 calculator sold over 500,000 copies in the first year. Bowmar then developed the "901B" calculator that was priced at $120.[32] In September 1972, Texas Instruments (TI) introduced the TI-2500 portable four-function calculator that also sold for $120.[33] The 901B and the TI-2500 both used the TI TMS0100 family of "calculator-on-a-chip" integrated circuit. TI was now directly competing with their IC customers. Other semiconductor companies such as National Semiconductor and Rockwell began selling calculators. Commodore Business Machines and other office equipment companies also got into the market. A frenzied price war started. .. The larger companies could sell below cost to win market share. Bowmar lost $20 million in 1974 and filed for bankruptcy.[34] Commodore acquired their IC supplier, MOS Technology. Texas Instruments won the price war but their calculator division lost $16 million in 1975.[35]

References:

32. Schnaars, Steven P. (1997). Marketing Strategy: Customers And Competition. Simon and Schuster. p. 48. ISBN 978-0-684-83191-6.

33. "New Products". Computer. IEEE. 5 (6): 59–63. November 1972. doi:10.1109/C-M.1972.216999. The TI-2500 portable electronic calculator is a four-function, full-floating decimal-point unit with an eight-digit light emitting-diode display. With a suggested retail price of under $120, the TI-2500 calculator is rechargeable and capable of portable or ac operation. The calculator was previewed in June 1972 and formally released on September 21, 1972

34.  Smith, William D. (February 11, 1975). "Bowmar Will Ask Reorganization". The New York Times. p. 55.

35.  Young (1998), 153–154. The book quotes the September 1975 Forbes magazine on the hand-calculator market. It also details the MITS stock offering.

--- end wiki page extracts ---

Ravi: Brutal! Bowmar's 901B pocket calculator used Texas Instruments' TI TMS0100 family of "calculator-on-a-chip" IC. Texas Instruments (TI) got into the market itself with its own pocket calculator product TI-2500 which used the same TMS0100 family IC, and competed directly with Bowmar's 901B product. TI sold below cost which TI could afford to do as it was a large company, but which Bowmar could not afford to do and so Bowmar was driven to bankruptcy! 

Dr. Wang being very knowledgeable about this digital electronics field could foresee this competition in calculators from the semiconductor companies but many of his colleagues in Wang company could not foresee it! As Dr. Wang was boss, he could go ahead with his decision to move out of calculator business in stages, even though many of his colleagues argued against it. It was fascinating to learn about this foresight and winning decision of Dr. Wang!

The other question that cropped up was what would be the new products that would maintain the company's growth, as the company, in stages, moved out of the calculator products. Fortunately for Wang company, two other product lines were at an advanced stage in development - the Wang 2200 general-purpose computer and "equipment for word processing".

Part 2 of this post series can be read here:  https://ravisiyermisc.blogspot.com/2021/04/chinese-american-computer-pioneer-wang_19.html .

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Readers may want to see my related posts listed below:

*) Some general quotations of An Wang from his book: Lessons: An Autobiography,  https://ravisiyermisc.blogspot.com/2021/06/some-general-quotations-of-wang-from.html , 30th June 2021.

*) My Wang VS computers software development work including over 30 months of assignments at Wang US & Europe centres in 1980s, https://ravisiyermisc.blogspot.com/2021/03/my-wang-vs-computers-software.html , 11th March 2021.

*) Some info. on John Chambers and his association with Wang Laboratories, based on Web articles, https://ravisiyermisc.blogspot.com/2019/01/some-info-on-john-chambers-and-his.html , 30th Jan. 2019

[I thank Lessons book authors & publisher, history.computer.org, Wikipedia, Wang Laboratories company (for brochures & manuals), archive.boston.com, Pauls' ... (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZEvD7j-taE), computerhistory.org, goodreads.com, americanhistory.si.edu, oldcalculatormuseum.com, thebattles.net, wang3300.org, Wang 3300 Movie (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiE9AS7c1lY) published by Tom Lake, ibm.com and historyofinformation.com, and have presumed that they will not have any objections to me sharing the above extract(s)/screenshots/pics (except Lessons book and Wikipedia extracts, most other extracts are small extracts) from their websites/videos/documents on this post which is freely viewable by all, and does not have any financial profit motive whatsoever.]

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