Do you remember how it all started…
Hi, Habr! This year, Fujitsu turned 80 years old! And we can’t miss our anniversary. Therefore, we decided to remember exactly how Fujitsu became the way it is known today. Anyone who is interested in how stepping switches have turned into supercomputers, is it possible to communicate by wire with power lines and what does the machine code written in kanji symbols ask for under cat.
Although the history of Fujitsu begins before 1935, it is considered that the founding year is exactly 1935, when Fujitsu Electric, then just starting its business together with the German Siemens AG, had a branch of Fuji Tsushinki Manufacturing Corporation. It is this subsidiary in the future was renamed Fujitsu Limited.
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It all began with automatic switches, which in those years were already in serious demand in the United States and European countries. After the earthquake that destroyed the cities of Tokyo and Yokohama, the Japanese government decided to introduce new telephone technologies to replace lost ones, which was the impetus for the rapid development of the telephony sector and the companies involved in it. Appeared quite exotic, at first glance, solutions. So, in 1940, Fuji Tsushinki began manufacturing devices for high-frequency communications over power lines. In the years of recovery and the period immediately following the Second World War, Fuji Tsushinki Manufacturing took the lead in producing telegraph equipment and switches in Japan.
By the 50s of the twentieth century, many Western technology companies had launched production of tube-based computers: unreliable, massive, and very expensive. Fujitsu, deciding to expand its field of activity, in 1954, under the leadership of the company's chief engineer, created the first Japanese electronic computer of the relay type, FACOM 100. Paper tape acted as a storage medium. And although the FACOM 100 was simply gigantic in size by modern standards, its computation speed was several times faster than that of humans, allowing it to significantly speed up research and scientific work. Four years later, an improved version was released, with greater performance and RAM, which fell to the taste of manufacturing enterprises.
FACOM128A - the first commercial ( and still working! ) Computer Fujitsu
In 1962, the president of Fujitsu, Mr. Kanjiro Okada, adopted the concept of “Unlimited Development”, which consolidated computers and computer technologies as the main vector of the company's development. In 1968, the computer FACOM 230-60 was released - the world's first microprocessor system, which has 2 processors and its own new OS. These computers turned out to be extremely popular among the population and instantly became “bestsellers”.
The era of the seventies marked for the company the transition to IBM-compatible computers and the entry into the number of mainframe manufacturers. Since in those years most of the widely used programs worked only in the IBM environment, in 1974, Fujitsu, in conjunction with Hitachi, released an IBM-compatible 4th generation computer, and 4 years later a contract was signed for the joint production of computers with Siemens AG. With the acquisition of Amdahl Corporation and its affiliation as a subsidiary, Fujitsu launched a series of FACOM M mainframes - one of the best mainframes of the time. And even NASA ordered software for their projects from Fujitsu, securing confidence in the Japanese company.
Further development of the company occurs by leaps and bounds. With the beginning of the era, Fujitsu PC releases its first personal computer FM-8, and in 1989 the 32-bit “hypermedia” personal computer FM-TOWNS was introduced.
The 90s were the heyday for Fujitsu. Incredible achievements followed one after another. That only cost the production of supercomputers, the basic principle of which was the vector parallel process. This has significantly improved the performance of HPC systems. In 1992, the company released the VPP 500, at that time the most high-performance vector parallel supercomputer.
Fujitsu VPP 500
Today, Fujitsu is a leading information and communications technology company offering a full range of technology products, solutions and services. Fujitsu has a large team of world-class experts in the field of systems and services and about 97,000 patents worldwide. Fujitsu supplies IT solutions to more than 70 countries around the world, and has more than 170,000 employees. In 2013, FORTUNE magazine named Fujitsu one of the “World’s Most Admired Companies”. The interests of the company extend very widely - from the creation of "environmentally friendly" plastic, which in a short time decomposes under the action of microorganisms, without causing harm to the environment, to the construction of robots capable of passing examinations to the university.
Advances in information technology have made people's dreams come true. Continuous progress ensured the development of a global hyper-connected society, brought significant changes in the business world, our personal life and in society as a whole. Without information technology, the modern world could not develop further.
Since its founding in 1935, Fujitsu, as a provider of solutions for IT infrastructures, has contributed to the development of society and to the success of customers. Constantly seeking to provide new opportunities based on information technology, Fujitsu aims to continuously create new services, caring for a prosperous future in which technology will benefit the person, not the person, technology.
Although the history of Fujitsu begins before 1935, it is considered that the founding year is exactly 1935, when Fujitsu Electric, then just starting its business together with the German Siemens AG, had a branch of Fuji Tsushinki Manufacturing Corporation. It is this subsidiary in the future was renamed Fujitsu Limited.
')
It all began with automatic switches, which in those years were already in serious demand in the United States and European countries. After the earthquake that destroyed the cities of Tokyo and Yokohama, the Japanese government decided to introduce new telephone technologies to replace lost ones, which was the impetus for the rapid development of the telephony sector and the companies involved in it. Appeared quite exotic, at first glance, solutions. So, in 1940, Fuji Tsushinki began manufacturing devices for high-frequency communications over power lines. In the years of recovery and the period immediately following the Second World War, Fuji Tsushinki Manufacturing took the lead in producing telegraph equipment and switches in Japan.
By the 50s of the twentieth century, many Western technology companies had launched production of tube-based computers: unreliable, massive, and very expensive. Fujitsu, deciding to expand its field of activity, in 1954, under the leadership of the company's chief engineer, created the first Japanese electronic computer of the relay type, FACOM 100. Paper tape acted as a storage medium. And although the FACOM 100 was simply gigantic in size by modern standards, its computation speed was several times faster than that of humans, allowing it to significantly speed up research and scientific work. Four years later, an improved version was released, with greater performance and RAM, which fell to the taste of manufacturing enterprises.
FACOM128A - the first commercial ( and still working! ) Computer Fujitsu
In 1962, the president of Fujitsu, Mr. Kanjiro Okada, adopted the concept of “Unlimited Development”, which consolidated computers and computer technologies as the main vector of the company's development. In 1968, the computer FACOM 230-60 was released - the world's first microprocessor system, which has 2 processors and its own new OS. These computers turned out to be extremely popular among the population and instantly became “bestsellers”.
The era of the seventies marked for the company the transition to IBM-compatible computers and the entry into the number of mainframe manufacturers. Since in those years most of the widely used programs worked only in the IBM environment, in 1974, Fujitsu, in conjunction with Hitachi, released an IBM-compatible 4th generation computer, and 4 years later a contract was signed for the joint production of computers with Siemens AG. With the acquisition of Amdahl Corporation and its affiliation as a subsidiary, Fujitsu launched a series of FACOM M mainframes - one of the best mainframes of the time. And even NASA ordered software for their projects from Fujitsu, securing confidence in the Japanese company.
Further development of the company occurs by leaps and bounds. With the beginning of the era, Fujitsu PC releases its first personal computer FM-8, and in 1989 the 32-bit “hypermedia” personal computer FM-TOWNS was introduced.
The 90s were the heyday for Fujitsu. Incredible achievements followed one after another. That only cost the production of supercomputers, the basic principle of which was the vector parallel process. This has significantly improved the performance of HPC systems. In 1992, the company released the VPP 500, at that time the most high-performance vector parallel supercomputer.
Fujitsu VPP 500
Today, Fujitsu is a leading information and communications technology company offering a full range of technology products, solutions and services. Fujitsu has a large team of world-class experts in the field of systems and services and about 97,000 patents worldwide. Fujitsu supplies IT solutions to more than 70 countries around the world, and has more than 170,000 employees. In 2013, FORTUNE magazine named Fujitsu one of the “World’s Most Admired Companies”. The interests of the company extend very widely - from the creation of "environmentally friendly" plastic, which in a short time decomposes under the action of microorganisms, without causing harm to the environment, to the construction of robots capable of passing examinations to the university.
Advances in information technology have made people's dreams come true. Continuous progress ensured the development of a global hyper-connected society, brought significant changes in the business world, our personal life and in society as a whole. Without information technology, the modern world could not develop further.
Since its founding in 1935, Fujitsu, as a provider of solutions for IT infrastructures, has contributed to the development of society and to the success of customers. Constantly seeking to provide new opportunities based on information technology, Fujitsu aims to continuously create new services, caring for a prosperous future in which technology will benefit the person, not the person, technology.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/268701/
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