Report and preliminary results of METEOR-Cruise M 41/1, Málaga - Libreville, 13.2.-15.3.1998 with partial results of METEOR CRUISE 41/2 Libreville-Vitória, 18.03.1998-15.04.1998

Abstract

The witness seminar ”The rise and expansion of IT consulting, 1964–1985” took place at The National Museum of Science and Technology in Stockholm on 1 April 2008 and was led by Gunnar Hesse. The panel consisted of representatives of many of the pioneers in Swedish IT consulting, including Lars Irstad, who founded the industry leader Programator in 1964; Lars Spångberg who founded RIAB as an offshoot of the Federation of Swedish Industry in 1968; Thord Wilkne, one of two founders of WM-data in 1969; Göran Garvner who founded Modulföretagen in 1972; Per Olof Persson, a leading figure in Statskonsult, the state-owned firm that was the biggest IT consultancy in Sweden in the 1970s; Kaj Green, the first CEO of Cap Gemini Sweden; Leif Nobel, CEO of Data Logic from 1979, and Hans G. Wahlberg, one of the founders of Enator in 1977. The seminar was divided in three parts. The first dealt with the period of early entrepreneurship up to c. 1975. It was agreed that there was no shortage of demand for consulting services and that the main challenge consisted in recruiting skilled personnel and managing them. The second part dealt with the expansion that set in from the mid-1970s. Here it was agreed that the management of knowledge workers still constituted the single biggest challenge, followed by the need to establish consistency in method. At this point a divergence in business strategy can be seen. WM-data became a provider of American standard applications in order to tie the customer base more tightly. Programator were successful in the minicomputing market and established joint ventures with several large companies, in effect taking over their IT departments. Enator moved up the value chain and aimed at integrating management consulting and IT consulting. By 1985 all the major companies were listed at the stock exchange and the industry may be described as well-established