itty bitty machine company, or "ibm", was a small computer retail store operating from December 1975 to 1980 in Evanston, Illinois, United States. Ted Nelson, Ray Borrill, and Jim Banish founded the company. Itty bitty machine company was one of the first stores to offer the Apple I computer. The company also demonstrated, sold and serviced the IMSAI 8080 Microcomputer, Processor Technology SOL-20 Terminal Computer, and kits from The Digital Group. Most hardware items were sold as Electronic kits. Or assembled and tested by employees. Most of the day to day employees were Northwestern University students, as well as High School students from Evanston High School and Lane Tech High School in Chicago. Original phone number was (312)328-6800, note last 4 digits are "6800", for Motorola 6800 processor. The original address until closing was 1316 Chicago Avenue Evanston, IL, which is walking distance from Northwestern University and around the corner from Nabih's Inc. which has been an Apple Authorized Reseller and Service Center since 1978.
In 1976, Y.P. Chen invested in Itty bitty machine company and suggested opened a second store in Lombard, IL on East Roosevelt Road nearer where Chen lived. Alan McNeil, a recent graduate of University of Illinois and student of Ted Nelson's was given the task of running that store. A store front in a mini mall in the 400 East Roosevelt Road area was found and converted. It had a much smaller stock than the Evanston store. That store was open about two years. itty bitty soon had competition from a new computer store Data Domain that opened in Arlington Heights, IL in 1977.
Itty bitty machine company also called themselves "ibm", making use of IBM's relative fame. It was deliberate irony on Ted Nelson's part. He knew the vast difference between a main frame and the tiny early home computers. Mythology has it that ibm was sued out of existence by the larger IBM. While they were in fact contacted by IBM lawyers, they were allowed to continue using the name, provided the letters were always in lowercase. IBM had nothing to do with itty bitty's undoing.
itty bitty was a case of a great idea at the right time, but normal small business problems eventually forced their closing. Jim Banish told Alan McNeil in February 1977 that itty bitty couldn't make payroll and that the company was in serious trouble because of an outstanding debt. A very large corporation had ordered 30 assembled IMSAI computers. itty bitty had gotten a loan to order the computers expecting to be paid in 90 days and make a good profit on assembly. The large corporation had taken delivery and had decided not to pay. Jim Banish said that because itty bitty's invoices had no penalty with interest specified, the large corporation had said the invoice was a zero-percent loan.
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