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A HISTORY OF COMPUTER COMMUNICATIONS: 1968 -1988
PRODUCTS
Each Product category in each market sector can consist of hundreds of competing alternatives; alternatives in the functionality of the product, in the underlying technology used to create the product, in the features of the product and in the number of manufacturers selling the product. For example, in the high speed lease-line modem category many speeds are available, such as 9600 bits per second (bps), which can be implemented in one of several technologies, each of which can offer dozens of different features and is offered by sale by dozens of manufacturers. The same is true for all the categories of products in Computer Communications. The choice of which products to focus on in this historical reconstruction is aided by hindsight with the most successful products and technologies selected.
PRODUCTS BY MARKET SECTOR
The history of Data Communications...
is told primarily through the story of three product categories: lease-line modems, statistical multiplexers and T-1 multiplexers. Curiously, even though all statistical multiplexers required the use of modems, invariably lease-line modems, and users of lease-line modems invariably used statistical multiplexers, few firms truly innovated both lease-line modems and statistical multiplexers. Codex was the exception. Likewise, few firms innovating statistical multiplexers made the leap to innovating networking T-1 multiplexers, the class of T-1 multiplexers to dominate. Micom became a very successful firm making the leap to a low-cost statistical multiplexer and yet first had to try reselling a T-1 multiplexer from another company before buying a firm innovating a different T-1 multiplexer. Why existing firms fail to innovate next generation products or products in categories co-evolving with their own is of particular interest in this history. No Data Communication firm successfully innovated either Networking or Internetworking products; successful as in products that achieved meaningful marketshares.
The history of Networking...
is the central history of this book and is closely observed as a technology trajectory from packet switching through Ethernet, then standards making and finally the resolution of networking protocols. How successfully the firms of Data Communication competed in Networking as well as how well the firms of Networking fared in Internetworking will also be a focus. The firms that dominated Networking were the ones that innovated local area networks (LANs), specifically Ethernet, although in the beginning hundreds of alternative products were offered to interconnect computers. The Data Communication firms sold DataPBXs, a product derived from their multiplexer technologies. It garnered early market leadership before being eclipsed by LANs. Ethernet LANs had to fend off many competing local area networking technologies, including the presumed winner, token ring, to be sold by IBM. The start-ups and the computer company, Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC), won the battle, in large measure by being first to the market with a product offering the best combination of functionality and price.
The history of Internetworking...
while just beginning as the historyof this reconstruction is concluded, in 1988, is again one of hundreds of firms entering the market and a few start-ups coming to dominate: notably cisco and Wellfleet. The very nature of what internetworking meant was a disputed question in the early years as many pundits and manufacturers believed the market was one of interconnecting voice communication products. And while voice-focused T-1 multiplexers jumped out of the starting blocks first, it would be the "true" products of Internetworking - bridges and routers - that would come to dominate and even quickly incorporate T-1 multiplexing as one of their features. Again the firms of Data Communications would get it wrong, just as they had in Networking. Why?
T-1 Multiplexers |
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| Data Communications 1979-1988 | 11 |
Bridges and Routers |
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| Internetworking 1983-1988 LANs over WANs | 12 |
Entrepreneurial Capitalism & Innovation:
A History of Computer Communications
1968 - 1988
By James Pelkey
An overview of the book schema is presented in the Introduction. It is organized by these three dominant
co-evolving market sectors and standards making.
One can explore any market sectors from vision to adaptation - below.