Systime Computers
Systime Computers Ltd was a British computer manufacturer and systems integrator of the 1970s and 1980s. During the late 1970s and early 1980s, Systime became the second-largest British manufacturer of computers, specializing in the minicomputer market.
The company was based in Leeds, England, and founded in 1973. Its success was based on selling systems built around OEM components from Digital Equipment Corporation, and it grew to have over 1,300 employees with turnover peaking around £60 million.
Systime was unusual among systems integrators in that it actually manufactured the hardware it sold to customers.
A portion of Systime was purchased in 1983 by Control Data Corporation and the company's founder departed. Systime Computers then went through a period of sharp decline, in part due to lawsuits from DEC for intellectual property infringement, and even more so due to charges of violating Cold War-era U.S. export restrictions regarding indirect sales to Eastern Bloc countries.
In 1985, what was left of Systime was fully acquired by Control Data Corporation, and a year later the DEC-related services part of that subsidiary was bought by DEC. Systime then focused on selling products built by its own engineers. The Systime–Control Data arrangement did not prosper, and in 1989 Control Data split Systime into four companies, each sold to a management buyout.
Origins of company
John Gow was a mechanical engineering graduate of the University of Leeds who had gone into computer programming and then became a software support manager at a Lancashire office of the British subsidiary of Digital Equipment Corporation. He also did some hardware sales work and realised that few of the customers to whom he was selling actually understood the capabilities of the computers they were buying. In 1972, Gow, then 27 years old, and three others set up a partnership on their own, labouring in Gow's bungalow workshop.Systime Computers Ltd was created the following year, being incorporated in October 1973. Gow and the three others moved their work into the canteen of an abandoned mill in Leeds.
Due to inadequate capitalisation – £2,800, in a field in which the minicomputers they would be selling cost £60,000 each – the new company had a shaky start and came close to going under right away. The key turning point was engaging with Leeds-based jukebox firm Musichire, which had purchased a computer from DEC but were struggling with it. Systime came in on a consulting basis and sold Musichire both software and new hardware. John Parkinson, financial director of Musichire, was sufficiently impressed with Gow's sales abilities that, in 1974, Musichire took a financial stake in Systime. Parkinson subsequently became chair of the board of directors of Systime.
Period of rapidly increasing growth
Gow emphasized that Systime would provide not just hardware but also software applications, systems engineering, and support. By 1975, Systime had £2.75 million in turnover and profits of £300,000 and was already opening offices and subsidiaries overseas.Musichire's stake in the company impeded the company's ability to grow. Gow engaged with financiers but did not like them and did not want to accept investment from either the Industrial and Commercial Finance Corporation or from merchant banks, fearing they would demand too much control of the company's direction.
However, in 1977 Gow arranged for investment firm Ivory and Sime to buy out Musichire's share. Around the same time,
the National Enterprise Board convinced Gow to sign up with them; they invested £500,000 in Systime in return for a 26 per cent stake in the young firm The NEB also facilitated the participation of Systime in a new marketing effort in an NEB subsidiary known as Insac Data Systems, which would promote exports of British technology products.
Systime's business model was selling products centred around computers originally built by DEC in the United States. They would take actual DEC components and put them together with items such as power supplies and storage cables that they built themselves or obtained from other industry sources. To this base of equipment, Systime added peripherals and software from other vendors and then added some of its own application software. This allowed Systime to provide full solutions to growing customers, such as Gordon Spice Cash and Carry, that were first embracing computerised line-of-business systems during the 1970s.
Accordingly, the Systime product lines were based around the minicomputers they produced, the most popular of which were the Systime 1000, Systime 3000, and Systime 5000, all based on different models of the DEC 16-bit PDP-11 minicomputer. The PDP-11-based Systime systems would typically run the DEC's RSTS/E operating system. These systems had many kinds of users; for instance, a botany group at the University of Reading used a Systime 5000.
Systime's use of the PDP-11 coincided with an upsurge in the popularity of that model within the computer-using community, one that DEC had not fully anticipated, leading to wait times up to three years for systems or components. As a result, Systime began manufacturing its own DEC-compatible memory boards and storage devices.
Later, the Systime 8000 series came out, which were based upon the DEC 32-bit VAX-11 supermini. The 8000 series had names that indicated the DEC model they were derived from, so the Systime 8750 was equivalent to the VAX-11/750 and the Systime 8780 was equivalent to the VAX-11/780. The Systime 8000 series systems could run DEC's VMS operating system, but many of them were instead running one variant or another of Unix. This was another successful product; by the mid-1980s around one-third of all VAXen in the United Kingdom were Systime-based systems.
A pure software product was Systel, the Systime Teleprocessing System, which acted as a transaction processing system with data dictionary-based programming assist features. As such it was a competitor to products such as TAPS from Informatics General on the PDP-11, but in 1980–81 Systime saw an opening on the VAX-11 where there were no rival teleprocessing monitors yet. Systel development was half-funded by the Insac arrangement and that entity received royalties on Systel sales. Systime had some success with Systel in the United Kingdom and Holland and made a push to sell it in the United States as well.
Ian Fallows was technical director of the company during the 1970s. Systime was rapidly hiring not just hardware engineers but also software engineers to work on operating systems, controllers, and telecommunications and networking components.
In 1980, Systime had turnover of £24.6 million and a profit of £1.6 million. Those figures increased to £32.1 million and £2.2 million in 1981, respectively. By then, Systime had some 1,150 employees and eleven offices around the United Kingdom. Systime was one of four companies short-listed for the Institute of Directors's annual Business Enterprise Award for 1981. It was an unusual case of a British company succeeding in making minicomputers, a market dominated by American firms. Despite its successes and fast growth, Systime was little known to the general public.
New facility and changes of management
In September 1981, Gow announced an ambitious three-year, £46 million expansion plan for Systime, including the building of a second large facility in Leeds, with some of the funding to come from the European Investment Bank and various government grants. The second facility was to enter the microcomputer business for small businesses and, in a first for Systime, would not rely upon DEC components. This reflected that Systime was in the process of manufacturing not just minicomputers but also desktop systems, as well as terminals and printers, most of which were targeted to the Western European market. Systime also ran a service bureau, that offered the creation of application software and that sold maintenance contracts on a third-party basis. In all, Systime's plans anticipated a doubling of its employee count.By 1983, Systime was considered, as The Times wrote, "one of the largest and fastest-growing British computer companies". It was the second largest computer manufacturer based in Britain, behind only the mainframe-oriented International Computers Limited. Ian McNeill was technical director of the company during this period. In addition, Systime was considered an exemplar of new industrial potential in Northern England, and the company was often visited by government ministers as a result.
However, the switch from the National Enterprise Board to the successor British Technology Group left Systime with uncertain funding while it was in the process of its big expansion; as Gow subsequently said, "we were sailing along and suddenly started to get really tight on cash. We'd outgrown our resources." Gow had previously considered organising a flotation but now did not have time to do so, so he sought investments from other British companies, but they all wanted to stage a full acquisition. In particular, there were meetings in January 1983 with two large British technology companies, Ferranti and Standard Telephones and Cables, that did not achieve fruition.
Instead, in March 1983, it was announced that Control Data Corporation was buying 38 per cent of Systime for £8 million, with another 25 per cent to be controlled by Ivory and Sime. At the same time, BTG reduced its investment down to 12 per cent. The two companies had had existing business dealings, as Systime bought many Control Data peripheral devices to include in its full systems. The recapitalisation of Systime was completed in June 1983. At this point, Parkinson departed as chair of Systime and retired from the industry altogether for a while.
The new facility, built for £20 million in a nearby area of Beeston, Leeds,
had begun operations in October 1982, with computer production taking place there. The facility was formally opened on 27 June 1983 by Princess Anne. The large building featured what one newspaper termed "a distinctive reflective glass front"; more popularly it became known as the "Glass Palace".
Image:Tyrrell at Silverstone Classic 2012.jpg|thumb|left|Systime sponsored a Tyrrell 012 racing car during the 1984 Formula One World Championship season
At its peak, Systime had some 1,370 employees and turnover of £60 million.
Systime was growing at a 30 per cent annual rate during the early-mid 1980s and the strain on its finances was considerable.
Systime attempted to gain a greater public visibility during this period. They became shirt sponsor for Leeds United F.C. for the 1983–84 season, only the second such sponsor in the club's history, and they sponsored a Tyrrell 012 car during the 1984 Formula One World Championship season, with drivers such as Stefan Bellof, Mike Thackwell, and Stefan Johansson.
Relations between Gow and Control Data management did not work out, with the two parties clashing on fundamental decisions. Accordingly, Gow departed Systime in December 1983. He was replaced as managing director by Rod Attwooll, formerly head of the UK division of Texas Instruments. Gow subsequently started his own firm, WGK Electronics, hoping to succeed in largely untapped third-world markets.