In the 1980s/90s I had a friend whose brother worked for IBM. He told me that IBM viewed its core business as building and servicing mainframes; it considered home PCs as a small niche market. After all, how many ordinary consumers would even want a computer?
“In the 1980s/90s I had a friend whose brother worked for IBM. He told me that IBM viewed its core business as building and servicing mainframes; it considered home PCs as a small niche market. After all, how many ordinary consumers would even want a computer?”
Yes, in part they did not see the “PC wave” building “soon enough”, but their other hardware systems, for businesses, did adapt to the growth of PC-networking, making their hardware able to be employed in network integrations. But, in terms of the PC itself, IBM simply remained true to its roots - a business serving businesses much more than the consumer. I heard IBMs tell me that some IBM execs, early on, were worried their many business customers were unprepared for the changes for the “PC wave” and would resent IBM pushing them into it or leaving them behind beacuuse they would be unable to change or adapt their application systems fast enough. So yes, IBM appeared to others to be moving too slowly.
In my own shop the transiton was inremental and gradual and not an overnight wholesale change.