DOCSLIB.ORG

The Founding, Fantastic Growth, and Fast Decline of Norsk Data AS

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
The Founding, Fantastic Growth, and Fast Decline of Norsk Data AS The founding, fantastic growth, and fast decline of Tor Olav Steine [email protected] The best view of Rondane.. The Ronde Castle, 2178m The High Ronde 2118m ..is seen from one of the lesser tops (the High Ronde in the back) www.norsk-data.no FFI Cipher Group 1966? The First Three and the Chairman Rolf Skår Lars Monrad-Krohn Per Bjørge TerjeMikalsen Product maturation through projects SAM2 Nord1 F-16 sim. Mac, Fortran ND 5,50,500.. SINTRAN NORTEXT LFK Net NOTIS TSS, QED CAD/CAM SIBAS, TPS ADMIN SW NSB, KOS, LEO The Nord 1 Wilh. Wilhelmsen Taimyr 1968: Nord 1 Radar support anti-collision Tokke hydro power stations Dave Walden in the Arpanet team D a v e ARPANET Logical Map, March 1977 Rolf Skår summed it up as follows: No Bo Lewendal, no TSS. No TSS, no CERN contract, Bo Lewendal ca 1971 No Cern contract, ND bankrupt in 1973! LHC: The Large Hadron Collider Geneva Airport Norsk Data delivered Nord 10 computers To control the SPS ring, starting in 1974. Robert Cailliau, Tim Berners-Lee (left) and Ted Nelson (right) at a WWW conference in Tokyo 1997. F16 simulator Saving flight hours in the air NSB Cargo Car Supervision (1976): - Wagon rating - Maintenance - Tracking Product maturation through projects SAM2 Nord1 F-16 sim. Mac, Fortran ND 5,50,500.. SINTRAN 1-3 NORTEXT LFK Net NOTIS TSS, QED CAD/CAM SIBAS, TPS ADMIN SW NSB, KOS, LEO The ND 10 Panel The NOTIS Concept The NOTIS Keyboard How do you inspire people to perform at a maximum level? The ND Spirit • Work: You spend at least half of your time awake at work—get the most out of it! • Solutions: Do not choose the easiest one, choose the one you think is right! • Work pressure: The reward usually is proportional with the difficulties. • Things you dislike: Do something about them, improve them if they are important enough. The ND Spirit, contd. • Work instructions: Until you are sure someone else has taken over the responsibility, the responsibility is your own. • Colleagues: Find out who are important for you (org. chart disregarded), and treat them accordingly. • Instincts: Be skeptical of some of them, do some of the things you dislike the most, talk to some of the persons you dislike the most. The ND Spirit, contd. • Performance: If you are honest to yourself, you are the best judge. • Improvements: You are allowed to propose improvements, even if you are not perfect yourself. • Obedience: If you are convinced that you are right, stick to it. • Personality: Be yourself. Like yourself. Improve yourself. • Mistakes: Admit them. • Chances: Take them. Successful ads Successful ads Successful products 5000 Results 1974-1990 4000 3000 Revenue 2000 Profit Emplyees 1000 0 1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 -1000 The Management Group So, what went wrong? What went wrong? • The price of oil dropped 50% (1986) • The Norwegian Government purchased less • Disruptive technologies emerged • Networked PCs, Unix Standardized platforms • Necessary shifts to systems integration not made • Norsk Data was caught in its growt spiral • Necessary changes would never had been accepted by stock holders • …and maybe a little arrogance • Continous, successful growth for 13 years does something to you. The new management group What more went wrong: The Coup de grâce: • A 200 MNOK convertible loan, to be repaid in full (by 1988?). • DnB guaranteed for the payback loan. • ND was eventually taken over by Den Norske Bank, who sold it to Telenor – the Norwegian state owned Telecom operator, for less than they could write off in taxes (because of inherent losses in the ND books) ND ceased to exist 1992 • The employees were dispersed between a number of companies.. – Umoe, Telenor, Ergo Group, Siemens, Bravida, EDB, etc. ----oOo---- 19. Sept 2007 500 ND-veterans gathered to celebrate the 40th anniversary of a company that ceased to exist 15 years ago! 40th anniversary Sept.19.2007 TerjeMikalsen Rolf Skår Lars Monrad-Krohn ND’s 40th anniversary at the Norwegian Technical Museum Kristen Nygård Ole Johan Dahl Inventors of object oriented programming: Simula Bård Sørbye Robert Cailliau Dave Walden Tor Olav Steine 2010.10.21R&D Norsk Data www coAlfatroll-inventor - CompanyInternet/BBN confidential R&D Norsk Data 39 ..resulting in Internet, WWW, and object oriented programming – in short: state of the art computing ND may not have invented the gunpowder … 2010.10.21but we heardAlfatrollthe - Companyexplosion confidential !! 40 The founding, fantastic growth, and fast decline of Tor Olav Steine [email protected].
Load more

Recommended publications
  • NORSK DATA AS SINTRAN Iii Reference Manual
    SINTRAN Il Reference Manual NORSK DATA AS SINTRAN IiI Reference Manual ND-60.128.03 NOTICE The information in this document is subject to change without notice. Norsk Data A.S assumes no responsibility for any errors that may appear in this document. Norsk Data A.S assumes no responsibility for-the use or reliability of its software on equipment that is not furnished or supported by Norsk Data A.S. The information described in this document is protected by copyright. It may not be photocopied, reproduced or translated without the prior consent of Norsk Data A.S. Copyright © 1983 by Norsk Data A.S This manual is in loose leaf form for ease of updating. Old pages may be removed and new pages easily inserted if the manual is revised. The loose leaf form also allows you to place the manual in a ring binder (A) for greater protection and convenience of use. Ring binders with 4 rings corre- sponding to the holes in the manual may be ordered in two widths, 30 mm and 40 mm. Use the order form below. The manual may also be placed in a plastic cover (B). This cover is more suitable for manuals of less than 100 pages than for large manuals. Plastic covers may also be ordered below. M= | ~ . IB== B 'S NORSK DATA AS NORSK DATA AS Bil=i & e lll\ ® A Ring Binder B Plastic Cover Please send your order to the local ND office or {in Norway) to: Documentation Department Norsk Data A.S P.0O. Box 4, Lindeberg gérd Oslo 10 ORDER FORM | would like to order Ring Binders, 30 mm, at nkr 20,- per binder Ring Binders, 40 mm, at nkr 25,- per binder Plastic Covers at nkr 10,- per cover NAME ..
    [Show full text]
  • EVOLUTION of Cowtrot SYSTEMS for Aecelsiato&S
    - 271 - EVOLUTION OF COWTROt SYSTEMS FOR AeCELSiAtO&S M.C. Crovley-Milling CRM, Geneva 1, HISTORICAL The ««liest accelerator* wer« quite •»*'. 1, and their controls few, as can be seen from fig. 1 which ahow* the 11-inch eye lot ron built by Lawrence and Livingstone in 1932. Control wm by switches sai variable resistors and indication by a variety of Meters, wired directly iota the appropriate circuit, Where the control eleaemt had to be at high vol• tage, a loop of string vat often uted Co operate it. I1* Figur* t : the 11-inch Cyclotron at Berkeley As the si«* and power of the accelerator* increased, they had to be surrounded by heavier and heavier »hielding, and the controls and indications had to be taken away from the accelerator lt»el£ and transferred to a separate control roo». At first this was done by ju»t extending the cables, keeping each control and indication separate, but the increa• sing number* of value» to be indicated led to some manual switching of instruments between different circuit* to save panel apace. In the 1980's, even though the cyclic, accelerators had grown up to 200 » in diameter, the expense of taking cables for every control element to the control too» was not exce««ive. However, in the i960'», project* of auch larger siae were being considered, where this would no longer be true. The first of theae was the "2-mile" electron lime at SLAC. This is composed of 240 alraott identical taodule*, each aodule having very many controls and indications of interest to the operators, The enormous number of cables which would be required to take all these to the control room was reduced considerably by rentóte awl t i- plexing; that is switching one particular control or indication from each «©«Joie in turn onto the s«se set of cables.
    [Show full text]
  • TU-P20 How to Survive the Upgrade Treadmill
    HOW TO SURVIVE THE UPGRADE TREADMILL Kirsten Hinsch, Ursula Lauströer, Rüdiger Schmitz, Winfried Schütte - DESY Hamburg, Germany Abstract Lets look a little closer on the impact of changes in Here at DESY we have nine large particle accelerators each part of our environment. and correspondingly a large and complex control system. It consists of subsystems of many generations of hard and 3 IMPACT OF CHANGES software. Until recently we even had to support Norsk Data mini computers so called NORDs. The number of 3.1 Changes in the accelerator applications is considerably more than a thousand. The This is a true place of peace and tranquility. Of course a control team consists of a dozen people aged typically in new accelerator needs a new control system. A closed one the fifties. This large, diverse and understaffed system in- does not need one anymore. Still a major change in the troduces a considerable amount of (healthy) inertia. On accelerator does not necessary have any imp act on the the other hand we have a fast hard- and software upgrade technologies used. It is just a good and most welcome op- cycle in the general computing scene. There is every few portunity to change things now. years a major operating system upgrade. This conflict produces tension and stimulation. 3.2 Network Network upgrades have moderate impact on the other 1 INTRODUCTION areas (fair degree of orthogonality). The major problem we have now is CISCOs mediocre IPX support. We ex- Everybody who works a few years in our field physical- pect this to get worse.
    [Show full text]
  • The Founding, Fantastic Growth, and Fast Decline of Norsk Data AS Tor Steine
    The Founding, Fantastic Growth, and Fast Decline of Norsk Data AS Tor Steine To cite this version: Tor Steine. The Founding, Fantastic Growth, and Fast Decline of Norsk Data AS. 3rd History of Nordic Computing (HiNC), Oct 2010, Stockholm, Sweden. pp.249-257, 10.1007/978-3-642-23315- 9_28. hal-01564615 HAL Id: hal-01564615 https://hal.inria.fr/hal-01564615 Submitted on 19 Jul 2017 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. Distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution| 4.0 International License The Founding, Fantastic Growth, and Fast Decline of Norsk Data AS Tor Olav Steine Formerly of Norsk Data AS [email protected] Abstract. Norsk Data was a remarkable company that in just twenty years went from a glimmer in the eyes of some computer enthusiasts to become number two in share value at the Oslo Stock Exchange. Within a few years thereafter, it collapsed, for no obvious reason. How was this tremendous success possible and why did the company collapse? Keywords: Collapse, computer, F16, industry, minicomputer, Norsk Data, Nord, simulator, success, Supermini 1 The Beginning 1.1 FFI A combination of circumstances led to the founding of Norsk Data1 in June 1967.
    [Show full text]
  • Fifty-Year Anniversaries in Norwegian Computing History
    EVENTS AND SIGHTINGS Editor: Chigusa Kita Fifty-Year Anniversaries in Norwegian Computing History wo fifty-year anniversaries in computing history were celebrated in Oslo in September 2017: the fifty-year T anniversary of the creation of the Simula program- ming language, and the fifty-year anniversary of the found- ing of the Norsk Data computer company. Simula The Simula 67 programming language, first formally defined in 1967, was a step in a series of developments by Ole-Johan Dahl and Kristen Nygaard that began in the early 1960s.1 Dahl and Nygaard were given the 2001 IEEE John von Neumann Medal and the ACM 2001 A.M. Turing Award for their creation of Simula. A fifty-year anniversary celebration for Simula took place (in the “Simula Auditorium” in the “Ole-Johan Dahl Building”) at the University of Oslo on 27 September 2017. PHOTO 1. Photo credit: Harald Brombach/digi.no. The celebration began with unveiling of a plaque from the IEEE History Committee’s Milestone program. The plaque reads: chaired by Eric Jul (“Whither Programming Languages? Can IEEE Milestone We Still Celebrate Simula 50 Years from Now?”) with partic- Object-oriented Programming, 1961–1967 ipation of the prior three speakers and Ole Lehrmann Mad- Ole-Johan Dahl and Kristen Nygaard created the sen and Olaf Owe.2 Videos from the event are available.3 Simula programming languages in the 1960s at the The previous afternoon, the Association of Simula Norwegian Computer Center, and in so doing intro- Users (ASU) held a several-hour meeting at which there duced a new way of modeling and simulating complex were six presentations and a wrap-up session.
    [Show full text]
  • The Oslo Cyclotron Data Acquisition System
    NO9100105 UNIVERSITY OF OSLO DAISY the Oslo Cyclotron Data Acquisition System T. Ramsøy Department of Physics, University of Oslo, Norway £>uf*-- Report91-21 • Received 1991-08-30 ISSN-0332 5571 *__' ,*.a-",' J";"^'^" DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICS REPORT SERIES Hi Ail lill JU ILI mil ..J Ji Jl lll'feiliili' Preface This document is intended for anyone that will use the Oslo cyclotron data acquisition system or wants to get some deeper understanding of the structure of the system. Each chapter is opened with a more general description. The contents should be known to all users. More technical information is found in the last part of the chapter. The source code listing is found in a separate volume, "DAISY - Volume 2, Appendix " available at the cyclotron laboratory. Oslo 30-08-1991 'T&H. (jo Tore Ramsøsøyy // Contents 1. Introduction 3 2. VME front-end system ........— „ 4 2.1 Getting started 4 2.1.1 Preparing for a run 6 2.1.2 Starting the data acquisition 9 2.1.3 Resetting the VME system 9 2.2 Hardware 11 2.2.1 Processor unit 11 2.2.2 Trigger pattern unit 12 2.2.3 NIM interface system 13 2.2.4 CAMAC interface 14 2.2.5 Power supply and crate 14 2.3 Software 15 2.3.1 Event_Builder 15 2.3.2 Memory allocation 17 2.3.3 Data format 18 2.3.4 Pattern bit allocation 19 2.3.5 Compilation and loading 21 3. VME to ND link 22 3.1 Operating the link 22 3.1.1 Restarting the DOMINO controller 22 3.2 Hardware 24 3.2.1 The DOMINO controller 24 3.2.2 Internal VMEbt) - crate 24 3.2.3 VME-VME link 24 3.2.4 Architecture 25 3.3 Software 26 3.3.1 Memory mapping 27 3.3.2 Compilation and loading 28 4.
    [Show full text]
  • The Pioneer Era in Norwegian Scientific Computing (1948 -1962)
    THE PIONEER ERA IN NORWEGIAN SCIENTIFIC COMPUTING (1948 -1962) Drude Berntsen Director of the Norwegian Computing Center 1970 – 1989; [email protected] Abstract: This paper gives a survey of the pioneer era in Norwegian scientific computing. Right after the Second World War research councils and research institutions were established and young scientists got scholarships to study abroad. Many caught interest in the new mathematical machines. In 1950, the Royal Norwegian Council for Scientific and Industrial Research decided to build a Norwegian computer, later called NUSSE, and by 1952 the Norwegian Computing Center for pure and applied research, was organized. The paper describes activities at the universities in Oslo, Bergen, and Trondheim, as well as at the Norwegian Defense Research Establishment at Kjeller. In the late 1950s, both the Central Bureau of Statistics and the Norwegian Meteorological Institute installed their first general-purpose computers. This was before such computers were installed at the University of Oslo and at the NTH, the technical university in Trondheim. The paper closes noting the contract signed in 1962 for the first UNIVAC 1107 to Europe. Key words: Scientific computing, pioneers, NUSSE, Norwegian 1. THE PERIOD BEFORE 1949 (BEFORE THE REAL START) The Central Bureau of Statistics in Norway ordered their first Hollerith tabulator in 1894. Norway used it for the censuses in 1900 and 1910. When the war broke out in 1940, there were 27 punched card installations in the country mostly in public offices, insurance companies, and in industry, but also some in the universities. Professor Svein Rosseland at the Institute of Theoretical Astrophysics at the University of Oslo (UiO) searched for tools and new methods for solving 24 Drude Berntsen differential equations.
    [Show full text]
  • Data Acquisition Using the 168/~ J
    SLAGPUB-3673 CERN/DD/83/4 March 1983 (W DATA ACQUISITION USING THE 168/~ J. T. CARROLL* Stanford Linear Accelerator Center Stanford University, Stanford, California 9&?&i and CERN, 1211 Geneva 23, Switzerland SCITTOLIN, M. DEMOULIN, A.FucqB. MARTIN A. NORTON, J.P. PORTE,P.Ross~ AND K.M STORR CERN, 1211 Genetie 23, Switierland - ABSTRACT Event sizes and data rates at the CERN i>p collider compose a formidable environ- ment for a high level trigger. A system using three 168/~ processors for experiment UAl real-time event selection is described. With 168/E data memory expanded to 512K bytes, each processor holds a complete event allowing a FORTRAN trigger al- gorithm accessto data from the entire detector. A smart CAMAC interface reads five Remus branches in parallel transferring one word to the target processor every 0.5 ps. The NORD host computer can simultaneously read an accepted event from another processor. -. Presented at the Three Day In-Depth Review on the Impact of Specialized Processors in Elementary Particle Physics, Padova, Italy, March 23-25, 1983. * Work supported by the Department of Energy, contract DEAC03-76SFOO515. 1. INTRODUCTION The UAl experiment uses a large image chamber central detector in a dipole mag- netic field. The Central Detector (CD) surrounded by electromagnetic and hadronic calorimeters, muon chambers and forward detectors is described extensively else- where.l The full detector has about 20,000 channels generating 1.6M bytes of raw data for each event. For the CD which produces most of this, zero suppression and data compaction yield an average of 38K bytes which must be recorded on tape.
    [Show full text]
  • Norsk Data AS, the Fenomenon (Brief) Content
    Norsk Data AS, The Fenomenon (brief) Tor Olav Steine, with the help of former colleaguesi . Abstract. Norsk Data was a remarkable company that went in just 20 years from a glimmer in the eyes of some computer enthusiasts to become number 2 in stock value at Oslo Stock Exchange. Then within a few years it collapsed, without obvious reason. How was this tremendous success possible and why did it collapse? NOTE: This history brief of the Norsk Data Company is based upon a Springer Verlag publication resulting from the HINC3 Conference in Stockholm 2010. It is ONLY for personal use, and not allowed for distribution or publishing. Content 1 The beginning ................................................................................................................................................. 2 2. The demanding customers .............................................................................................................................. 4 3 The years of fast growth ................................................................................................................................. 7 4. Crisis and downfall ......................................................................................................................................... 9 6. About the Author .......................................................................................................................................... 11 7. References ...................................................................................................................................................
    [Show full text]
  • Internett.No/Historie
    Unn Kristin Daling og Øyvind Thomassen Internett.no/historie NTNU Trondheim 2006 Innhald Kapittel 1: Innleiing 1 Måtar å forstå og forklare Internett på 2 Internett som teknologipolitikk 3 Internett - resultat av forsvarspolitikk eller vitskapleg idealisme 5 Utfordringar i det å skrive om Internett 6 Kapittel 2: Galaktisk nett 9 Internettet som ein "endelaus frontier" 10 ”Galactic Network” 13 Kald krig - networking for fred 16 Pakkesvitsjing 18 Todelt arkitektur 22 ARPAnet – Fugl Fønix stig opp 23 Europa koplast til ARPAnet 27 Larry Roberts og Bob Kahn på besøk hos FFI 29 Eksperimentelle nett i ARPAnet og Xerox 31 SATNET 34 Eit nett av nett 35 Noreg blir først på ARPAnet 37 Det var ganske alvorlig altså…. ingen ville snakke om det… 38 FFI koplast til ARPAnet 41 Eit nett utan grenser 44 Avslutning 46 Kapittel 3: Internett 55 ARPAnet delast i to nett 56 CSNet, BITNET og NSFNET 57 På veg mot noko nytt… 59 This software’s going to change everything… 60 www legg grunnlaget for det globale Internett 61 Nettlesarkrigen 65 Verda går online 69 Det idealistiske Internett 72 USENET til Noreg 75 Hacker-rørsla tar form 76 Free Software versus Open Source 78 Phreaks og Crackers 82 Avslutning 85 Kapittel 4: Forskingsnett 91 Dele på datamaskinkapasitet ved distribuert datahandsaming 92 Televerket sitt prøvedatanett – eit nordisk prosjekt 94 Pakkesvitsj eller linesvitsj? 98 Kontaktgruppa for televerkssamarbeid 99 Distribuert datahandsaming og fleksibel brukerterminal 104 Lokalnettplanar i Trondheim 106 Frå lastebil til fjerndataterminal 107 Lokalnettplanar
    [Show full text]
  • Output Devices
    TUGboat, Volume 2, No. 1 OUTPUT DEVICES: A NEW COLUMN familiar?) Along with this came other smaller prob- Barry Doherty lems, including the problem of making PASCAL mn,in an interactive mode in Om(Stanford's To aid the development of output device inter- timesharing system). My primary objective wss to faces, we would like to collect and report informa- get PASCAL/VS up and running for the Stanford tion on work in progress on interfaces. It would community. Hence, this is where the main burst greatly help both those who are considering install- of activity is taking place. Of course, will be ing an output device and those who are working on the first major program to be run using interactive interfaces to have information on who is working on PASCAL. Projections about when a working version interfaces for which devices. If you are involved in of 'l)jX will be available run in the neighborhood of such a project, please send TUGboat the following the end of February to mid-March (1981), although information for this column: no ked commitment is being made at this time. - host computer (and operating system); Some initial looking into the hardware to be used - output device; for printing 'I$$at Stanford has begun, but this is a - status of the work; separate project and nothing substantial can be said - your name and phone number and your or- at this time. ganiration's name and address. Those interested in information on the availability Please send all information to TUGboat. We'll start of the 'I?@implementation at C.I.T.
    [Show full text]
  • Evolution of Real Time Computer Systems for Test Benches a Computer System for a Test Bench  Spoilt for Choice
    Evolution of real time computer systems for test benches A computer system for a test bench spoilt for choice Stuchlik, Wolfgang∗ German Aerospace Center (DLR) Institute of Space Propulsion 74239 Hardthausen, Germany April 25, 2016 1 Abstract • The costs associated with processors have fallen due to the eects of mass production. This paper covers the development of computer systems during the course of the last 25 years for • Commercial operating systems have no prob- the Ariane project ESA test benches P5, P4.1 and lem with the management of computer mem- P4.2. On these test benches the DLR-teams are ories measured in GBytes. testing and qualifying the rocket engines "Vul- cain2", "Vinci" and "Aestus". Twenty-ve years • The probability of failure associated with elec- ago the criteria for specication and procurement tronic components is much lower. for test bench computer systems was very dierent from today. The procurement lead-time for components has Mostly the systems were custom made and very of- been reduced. An Internet connection allows a ten the component interfaces had to be developed permanent connection between customer and sup- specically for the site. Systems oering high reli- plier. The thermal eects on the system have ability, that would run 24 hours a day and on 365 been reduced dramatically due to the reduction days a year were very much the exception. in the amount of internally generated heat within The preventive and reactive maintenance were not the components. The operation of a system no only cost intensive but also very complicated and longer requires specialist knowledge since the man labour-intensive.
    [Show full text]