ABSTRACT
Developments in telecommunications and smaller computers have made distributed data processing possible, in which computers can communicate and share out tasks, whether through a local area network or other means such as satellites. Computer services also constitute a significant part of the industry selling not pieces of hardware and software but the use of these to customers. Both products and services are being sold. These and other developments have been at the centre of a major transformation of the computer business, and one which is affecting the process technology and products of a host of other industries. In the fifties and sixties most computer users were institutions with technically sophisticated staff and specialists. No one computer system is made entirely within one country and imports and exports to and from each country are kept roughly in balance so that the company cannot be charged with upsetting the balance of payments.
