Core International, Inc., commonly referred to as Core, was a multinational

computer A computer is a machine that can be programmed to Execution (computing), carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (computation) automatically. Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic sets of operations known as C ...

and

technology Technology is the application of knowledge to reach practical goals in a specifiable and reproducible way. The word ''technology'' may also mean the product of such an endeavor. The use of technology is widely prevalent in medicine, science, ...

corporation headquartered in

Boca Raton Boca Raton ( ; es, Boca Ratón, link=no, ) is a city in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States. It was first incorporated on August 2, 1924, as "Bocaratone," and then incorporated as "Boca Raton" in 1925. The population was 97,422 in the ...

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

, United States. The company is now part of

Sony , commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professional ...

and no longer exists as stand-alone identity. The company was founded in 1979 by Hal Prewitt as a technology firm to develop, market and support computer related products and services. They were best known for supporting IBM's first business

microcomputer A microcomputer is a small, relatively inexpensive computer having a central processing unit (CPU) made out of a microprocessor. The computer also includes memory and input/output (I/O) circuitry together mounted on a printed circuit board (PC ...

s such as the

5100 5100 may refer to: Time * A.D. 5100, a year in the 6th millennium CE * 5100 BC, a year in the 6th millennium BCE Products * Atari 5100, a home videogame console * GWR 5100 Class, a class of side tank steam locomotive * IBM 5100 (IBM Portable Com ...

, 5110 and 5120. With the introduction of the

IBM PC The IBM Personal Computer (model 5150, commonly known as the IBM PC) is the first microcomputer released in the IBM PC model line and the basis for the IBM PC compatible de facto standard. Released on August 12, 1981, it was created by a team ...

and PC AT, the company provided an extensive line of

disk drives Data storage is the recording (storing) of information (data) in a storage medium. Handwriting, phonographic recording, magnetic tape, and optical discs are all examples of storage media. Biological molecules such as RNA and DNA are conside ...

backup In information technology, a backup, or data backup is a copy of computer data taken and stored elsewhere so that it may be used to restore the original after a data loss event. The verb form, referring to the process of doing so, is "back up", w ...

and

personal computer A personal computer (PC) is a multi-purpose microcomputer whose size, capabilities, and price make it feasible for individual use. Personal computers are intended to be operated directly by an end user, rather than by a computer expert or tec ...

products. Core became very well known as a leading industry developer of disk array and

computer data storage Computer data storage is a technology consisting of computer components and Data storage, recording media that are used to retain digital data (computing), data. It is a core function and fundamental component of computers. The central pro ...

. Many of Core's products were the first of their kind, had no direct competition and were widely regarded for their superior performance and reliability. Users and the computer press raved about Core's products.

InfoWorld ''InfoWorld'' (abbreviated IW) is an information technology media business. Founded in 1978, it began as a monthly magazine. In 2007, it transitioned to a web-only publication. Its parent company today is International Data Group, and its siste ...

described Core's ATplus "is built like a Sherman tank, offering exceptional performance and reliability."

PC Magazine ''PC Magazine'' (shortened as ''PCMag'') is an American computer magazine published by Ziff Davis. A print edition was published from 1982 to January 2009. Publication of online editions started in late 1994 and have continued to the present d ...

called them "Workhorses of Performance Computing" and "High-quality construction..breaks the speed barrier for access times" and asked "Will other manufactures follow suit?" Core was known for their advertising and perhaps produced a few of the PC Industry's greatest promotions. The 1985 and 1986 rebate and recall Ad for IBM PC AT

hard disk drives A hard disk drive (HDD), hard disk, hard drive, or fixed disk is an electro-mechanical data storage device that stores and retrieves digital data using magnetic storage with one or more rigid rapidly rotating hard disk platter, platters ...

. So successful and controversial, there was a rumor it was a topic at an IBM

board of directors A board of directors (commonly referred simply as the board) is an executive committee that jointly supervises the activities of an organization, which can be either a for-profit or a nonprofit organization such as a business, nonprofit organiz ...

meeting. And the time where they gave away a free IBM PC AT when purchasing one of Core's ATplus 72 MB drives. Core remained a

private Private or privates may refer to: Music * " In Private", by Dusty Springfield from the 1990 album ''Reputation'' * Private (band), a Denmark-based band * "Private" (Ryōko Hirosue song), from the 1999 album ''Private'', written and also recorde ...

company solely owned by Prewitt until 1993 when purchased by Aiwa, which was a wholly owned subsidiary of

History

For business history pre-incorporation

1975–1980: Founding

The company was built on the early work of Prewitt using his business and

development experiences. This was the period during the creation of the first

s, the launch of the

Altair 8800 The Altair 8800 is a microcomputer designed in 1974 by MITS and based on the Intel 8080 CPU. Interest grew quickly after it was featured on the cover of the January 1975 issue of Popular Electronics and was sold by mail order through advertiseme ...

and founding of

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washing ...

. He was selling and programming Minicomputers and assembling these

s, attaching

computer peripheral A peripheral or peripheral device is an auxiliary device used to put information into and get information out of a computer. The term ''peripheral device'' refers to all hardware components that are attached to a computer and are controlled by the ...

s, programming and building them into business computer systems. Core was created under a different

business model A business model describes how an organization creates, delivers, and captures value,''Business Model Generation'', Alexander Osterwalder, Yves Pigneur, Alan Smith, and 470 practitioners from 45 countries, self-published, 2010 in economic, social, ...

. Initially, it was marketed as an

association Association may refer to: *Club (organization), an association of two or more people united by a common interest or goal *Trade association, an organization founded and funded by businesses that operate in a specific industry *Voluntary associatio ...

and structured as a

for-profit organization Business is the practice of making one's living or making money by producing or buying and selling products (such as goods and services). It is also "any activity or enterprise entered into for profit." Having a business name does not separat ...

specifically for users of the IBM 5100 Series and

IBM System/23 The System/23 Datamaster (Model 5322 desktop model and Model 5324 floor model) was announced by IBM in July 1981. The Datamaster was the least expensive IBM computer until the far less expensive and far more popular IBM PC was announced in the fo ...

. The objective was to sell by mail-order computer supplies, pre-developed (

off-the-shelf Off-the-shelf may refer to: * Commercial off-the-shelf, a phrase in computing and industrial supply terminology * Government off-the-shelf * Ready-to-wear * Shelf corporation, a type of company * Off the Shelf Festival, a festival of writing and r ...

) programs and hardware maintenance service. Supplies included printer ribbons and

paper Paper is a thin sheet material produced by mechanically or chemically processing cellulose fibres derived from wood, rags, grasses or other vegetable sources in water, draining the water through fine mesh leaving the fibre evenly distributed ...

diskettes A floppy disk or floppy diskette (casually referred to as a floppy, or a diskette) is an obsolescent type of disk storage composed of a thin and flexible disk of a magnetic storage medium in a square or nearly square plastic enclosure lined wi ...

, tape cartridges. Software ranged from simple mortgage interest calculations, word processing, games and utilities to advanced payroll, accounting and industry specific applications. Users wanted readily available, simple to install and support for software that was also low in cost. Core was able to fill this niche because IBM had developed the machines with engineering and scientific applications in mind, while business programs such as construction, agriculture, and manufacturing were not generally available. Computer maintenance was an insurance program that provided on-site repairs and replacement parts, all provided by IBM service but at a lower cost than available directly from IBM. The company was very successful attracting users of the IBM 5100 Series as many IBM Sales Representatives referred their customers to the organization. While Core grew, profits were used for the continuing development of

1981–1983: Hard disk drives, LAN and PC for IBM 5100 series

These IBM machines had a

closed architecture Open architecture is a type of computer architecture or software architecture intended to make adding, upgrading, and swapping components with other computers easy. For example, the IBM PC, Amiga 500 and Apple IIe have an open architecture support ...

, with most of the design information unpublished and held secret. Computer systems of this design are extremely or most likely impossible to have the ability to swap components, obtain support from other vendors or upgrade to better configuration/another model unless that option is available from the original manufacturer. The limitations make a customer dependent on one vendor for products and services for the software and hardware parts of the system. Core sensed an opportunity to provide greater and faster

. After a five-year effort, in September 1982 they announced the availability of the first

and local area network (LAN) for the IBM 5100 Series. IBM systems as sold were storage limited and without a network option; the

had tape with the 5110 and 5120 restricted to 1.2 MB floppy disks. Core drives were available starting at 10 MB and increased up to 160 MB in removable and fixed configurations. CoreNet, the

LAN Lan or LAN may also refer to: Science and technology * Local asymptotic normality, a fundamental property of regular models in statistics * Longitude of the ascending node, one of the orbital elements used to specify the orbit of an object in sp ...

built into each Core

storage system Computer data storage is a technology consisting of computer components and recording media that are used to retain digital data. It is a core function and fundamental component of computers. The central processing unit (CPU) of a computer ...

, allowed interconnection of up to eight IBM 5100 Series systems, providing the ability to share storage and data. This configuration pre-dated LANs of the period for the

and compatibles. In 1983, Core introduced two major solutions as IBM was withdrawing from marketing the IBM 5100 series. First, software called PC51 that would run allowed 5100 series computer programs written in BASIC to run unmodified on the IBM PC and compatibles under

MS-DOS MS-DOS ( ; acronym for Microsoft Disk Operating System, also known as Microsoft DOS) is an operating system for x86-based personal computers mostly developed by Microsoft. Collectively, MS-DOS, its rebranding as IBM PC DOS, and a few ope ...

. And second, a LAN card for the IBM PC and compatibles that provided connection to the IBM 5100 Series network. These solutions allowed IBM 5110/5120 series users to add new technology and increase productivity while retaining their investment in equipment and software. Core's development of their

storage systems Storage may refer to: Goods Containers * Dry cask storage, for storing high-level radioactive waste * Food storage * Intermodal container, cargo shipping * Storage tank Facilities * Garage (residential), a storage space normally used to store car ...

, LAN and PC51 software was major

engineering Engineering is the use of scientific method, scientific principles to design and build machines, structures, and other items, including bridges, tunnels, roads, vehicles, and buildings. The discipline of engineering encompasses a broad rang ...

feat without rivals. Due to the complexity and the successful

reverse engineering Reverse engineering (also known as backwards engineering or back engineering) is a process or method through which one attempts to understand through deductive reasoning how a previously made device, process, system, or piece of software accompli ...

of the systems, resulted in

captive market Captive markets are markets where the potential consumers face a severely limited number of competitive suppliers; their only choices are to purchase what is available or to make no purchase at all. The term therefore applies to any market where t ...

as they were the only organization able to provide an upgrade path for these IBM owners.

1984–1986: Educating the marketplace, IBM VAD, hard disk drives, PC and backup

In 1984, CORE expanded its product focus and entered the

(PC) marketplace. The company's first product introduced the year before, called PC-51, was a completely new operating system (and language) for the

and compatibles. It enabled a PC to function like an IBM 5110/5120 system, demonstrating the company's strong software development capabilities. Not only did this allow users to continue using the application software they had already developed, but it increased processing speed by a factor of two to ten times, and reduced maintenance cost up to 90%. This new product opened up an unexplored marketplace for CORE by allowing the company to become an IBM value-added dealer (VAD) and sell both the IBM PC and CORE products individually and as a combined package. IBM authorized and promoted this relationship because it provided an upgrade path for their customers that was previously unavailable. As a result of the early development effort for the IBM 5100 series, CORE released its own family of high-performance hard disk drives called the ATplus Series, with better capacity, reliability and performance than IBM's drives. A few weeks after the introduction of the new

IBM AT The IBM Personal Computer/AT (model 5170, abbreviated as IBM AT or PC/AT) was released in 1984 as the fourth model in the IBM Personal Computer line, following the IBM PC/XT and its IBM Portable PC variant. It was designed around the Intel 8028 ...

in August 1984, CORE discovered problems in the factory-issued hard disk drive. As the media and marketplace learned of IBM's disk problems, CORE was once again in a unique position to capitalize on an opportunity, without any significant competition. For more than six months the IBM AT the model with the CMI was in short supply. Delays were attributed to lack of drives, technical problems with the machine or some other undisclosed issues. Core desired a major partner and selected Control Data Corporation (CDC) to assist with the introduction of the drives for the PC marketplace. The announcement was made in February 1985 and generated a significant amount of press coverage. Core discovered that a general lack of understanding existed among the

news media The news media or news industry are forms of mass media that focus on delivering news to the general public or a target public. These include news agencies, print media (newspapers, news magazines), broadcast news (radio and television), and th ...

and users regarding technology of different computer and mass storage systems. Few understood the value of different systems to the end-user or how to rate the many choices in the marketplace. In response, Core began placing considerable emphasis on user education, which resulted in a major contribution to computer industry. Directly from these efforts, the news media, computer magazines, product reviewers, dealers and computer manufactures started discussing, providing and promoting "

seek time Higher performance in hard disk drives comes from devices which have better performance characteristics. These performance characteristics can be grouped into two categories: access time and data transfer time (or rate). Access time The ''access ...

", " access time", " transfer time" and how to value or understand

importance in a computer system. The company believed the more end-users learned about computers and the engineering behind Core products, the less these users wanted any other product. Purchasers of the IBM AT were reporting some dealers were installing inferior drives into the computer without disclosing the fact. To help buyers and for industry education, Core developed the DiskP program, later replaced by the COREtest (DOS based), to identify sub-standard products by providing a visual demonstration of the speed and comparative measurements of hard disk drives and controllers. Many computer publications, hardware manufacturers, distributors, dealers and independent evaluation firms relied on COREtest for product comparison, which made COREtest the industry standard and most often quoted benchmark. As these programs were provide without charge and freely available from

BBS BBS may refer to: Ammunition * BBs, BB gun metal bullets * BBs, airsoft gun plastic pellets Computing and gaming * Bulletin board system, a computer server users dial into via dial-up or telnet; precursor to the Internet * BIOS Boot Specificat ...

, computer magazines and dealers, it is believed there was an installed base of over million copies worldwide promoting Core technology and education. For more than two years, newspapers, magazines and computer publications ran stories on the IBM AT and Computer Memories Inc. (CMI) hard disk drives problems.

References

External links

{{portal, Companies
Sony official website
Defunct computer companies of the United States Defunct computer hardware companies Defunct software companies of the United States Computer storage companies Backup software Hard disk drives Portable hard drives RAID Software companies based in Florida Companies based in Boca Raton, Florida American companies established in 1979 Computer companies established in 1979 Software companies established in 1979 American companies disestablished in 1993 Computer companies disestablished in 1993 Software companies disestablished in 1993 1979 establishments in Florida 1993 disestablishments in Florida Defunct manufacturing companies based in Florida