Bizmac

RCA introduced the Bizmac computer in 1956, the company's first computer with commercial potential. Initially it was installed for military use, as in the above picture where Arthur Malcarney of RCA explains the control panel to Brig. General Nelson Lynde of the Army Ordnance Tank-Automotive Command in Detroit. The army purchased the $4 million machine containing 25,000 vacuum tubes for inventory management. RCA was criticized for not producing a transistorized computer, as the company was a primary researcher in that field, but they did implement the transistorized 501 computer two years later. RCA and IBM competed in the data processing field for about 15 years, but IBM always had a much larger market share. RCA withdrew from computer manufacture in 1971.