Computer Centre Reflects Equipment Expansion

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32351, 17 July 1970, Page 16

Computer Centre Reflects Equipment Expansion

The development and expansion of the range of office equipment had driven his company to larger premises to cope with the work in Christchurch, said the general manager of Burroughs, Ltd (Mr J. I. Martin), yesterday. In 1950 the company had 1500 machines in Christchurch, in 1960 3200, and this year has 6500. Mr Martin was speaking at the opening of the Burroughs Computer Centre in Bealey Avenue, where more than $600,000 worth of the very latest business machinery is located. The centre-piece of the company’s calculating hardware is a computer valued at more than $300,000 which is capable of doing three jobs at once, at speeds many times greater than computers of a decade ago. Mr Martin said the future

would be spectacular in the field of computers, as they became more widely used and accepted. The new Christchurch centre will provide facilities for customersupport services, which until now have only been available in North Island centres. “This major extension of our Christchurch facilities is designed to service this rapid expansion in the South Island,” said Mr Martin. The centre has classroom facilities to provide courses for systems analysts and engineering personnel Programming courses in assembler and Cobol languages will also be conducted. The company will make block time available to those firms wishing to use a computer, but not install their own. Bureau facilities will be available to offer users the best solution to their dataprocessing problems.