The mainframe turns 50, or, why the IBM System/360 launch was the dawn of enterprise IT

In many ways, the modern computer era began in the New Englander Motor Hotel in Greenwich, Connecticut.
It was there in 1961 that a task force of top IBM engineers met in secret to figure out how to build the next-generation IBM computer.
A new design was sorely needed. IBM already sold a number of successful though entirely separate computer lines, but they were becoming increasingly difficult to maintain and update.
 
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