Early History
The firm began life in 1966 as Computer Software Systems, a consulting firm headed by Bob Bernard. In 1967, joined by Dick Orenstein (one of the authors of CTSS), the company began exploring the idea of offering time-sharing services based on CP/CMS. After IBM released CP/CMS under the IBM Type-III Library in 1968, and thus became available to CSS, this dream became possible. The small firm persuaded IBM to take an order for a S/360-67, and key technical people were recruited.The machine was delivered in November 1968. Harold Feinleib, an early recruit from MIT, describes the situation:
I couldn’t imagine what the IBM people must have been thinking. This machine cost close to $100K a month to rent so I am sure they were quite concerned to accept the order from a couple of young guys. Even most big companies didn’t have machines this powerful. This was their latest technology and we were one of the first to order one.
By December 1968, the firm was reselling time. Needing more capital to expand, the company went public in 1970, changing its name to "National CSS" (because "CSS" was not available nationwide). After a couple of hard years, business took off in the mid 70s.
Read more about this topic: National CSS
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