A team given eighteen months and almost no support built the machine that would define computing for the rest of the century.
A Giant Under Pressure
The International Business Machines corporation held a dominant market position during the final years of the 1970s. Massive mainframe computers from this company provided the processing power for international banks, government agencies and large businesses - but internal employees felt a growing sense of urgency regarding market shifts. Small and inexpensive computers from new competitors like Apple, Commodore & Tandy occupied household tables plus small business offices. To the general public, IBM did not offer products in this category.
The executives at IBM realized that the existing corporate administrative structures would require multiple years to develop a microcomputer. Those leaders initiated a significant departure from standard company operations. They established a physically separate group in Boca Raton, Florida, which carried the designation "Project Chess". The project started with a primary unit of twelve engineers who later received the title "The Dirty Dozen". By the conclusion of 1980, the workforce for this task grew to approximately 150 employees. It functioned under the leadership of a director named Don Estridge, who accepted unconventional methods, while William C. Lowe provided general oversight. Their instructions were clear and without historical precedent - they must construct a low cost personal computer within one year and ignore standard corporate procedures.
Building With Borrowed Parts
To meet this extremely difficult time limit, Estridge and the engineers made a decision that changed industry history. They chose not to produce every individual component within their own factories. They purchased standardized parts from external suppliers. For the central processing unit of the device, they chose the Intel 8088 hardware. As for the software that manages the hardware, they contacted a small and new software business in Washington state called Microsoft.
The organization Microsoft, which Bill Gates managed, lacked a completed operating system for the Intel processor. To resolve this Microsoft obtained a license for the software 86‑DOS from Seattle Computer Products during the final months of 1980. They subsequently bought all ownership of this software for $50 000 on July 27, 1981. The employees at Microsoft modified the code and provided it to IBM under the name PC‑DOS. In a private discussion, Microsoft kept the legal authority to sell the software to different computer manufacturers. The representatives for IBM permitted this term because they expected that financial gains would come from the sale of physical components.
The Launch
On August 12, 1981, IBM showed the IBM Personal Computer Model 5150 to the public. As the price began at $1 565, the smallest setup included 16 kilobytes of memory and zero disk drives - but purchasers could install floppy drives, a single color screen or a multi color screen. It was also possible to connect a cassette recorder or a television using a composite cable. The expensive versions featured two floppy disk drives and a sharp single color display. By design the IBM PC was modular and easy for a technician to open, which differed from the closed containers that Apple sold. To assist users IBM printed a technical manual that included the electrical diagrams and the hardware details.
The release resulted in a high volume of sales. The total number of orders was much higher than the predictions that IBM had made, and this computer caused managers at large United States corporations to view small computers as professional tools. But the speed with which IBM entered the market created results that the company did not expect.
Cloning the Standard
The open design of the hardware allowed other manufacturers to purchase the same Intel processors and standard parts that IBM used. The primary difficulty for companies attempting to replicate the device was the BIOS, which is the software that connects the physical components to the operating programs. Those manufacturers avoided legal issues regarding the copyrighted code by using "clean‑room" reverse engineering to build a new version of the software.
By the middle of the 1980s, corporations like Compaq sold "clones" that cost less money and functioned with the identical software as the IBM PC. As Microsoft owned the rights to sell the operating system to multiple parties, Bill Gates provided MS-DOS to every manufacturer that produced compatible hardware.
The standardized system that the Project Chess team developed caused the use of personal computers to grow rapidly across many countries - but IBM was unable to maintain its control over this expanding market. Although the company eventually held a smaller share of sales, the technical structure that engineers created in Boca Raton is the basis for contemporary computers. It is a permanent result of a short schedule and a decision to use unfamiliar methods.