A dreamer like Pier Giorgio Perotto who, of course, has not only imagined a new future for technology and for mankind, could not fail to be told in this section of Italian Tech, “Dreamers Who Do”.
Twenty years ago Italy lost one of its greatest innovators, Pier Giorgio Perotto, the inventor of the first desktop pc in history: the Olivetti 101 program. His innovations with revolutionary thinking, obviously in line with the Olivetti ontology of putting man at the center in all technological innovations, will be told in Ivrea on 4 February, at 5.15 pm, at the event “P 101 the machine that changed the relationship between man and data” (in presence at the Ivrea Visitor Center, or in live streaming).
Perotto
The father of the first desktop computer, Turin, born in 1930, graduated from the Polytechnic, joined Fiat in 1955 and it was there that his passion for computers began. A couple of years later he moved to Olivetti, and in 1962 he began working on the project of a machine for processing data (a computer) that was simple to use and could fit on any desk. From 1967 to 1978 he was general manager of Olivetti’s projects and research, taking the Ivrea multinational from a mechanical company to an electronic and systems company.
An invention that brought man to the moon
In 1964 Pier Giorgio Perotto and his collaborators Giovanni De Sandre and Gastone Garziera created the Program 101, a computer designed on a human scale, for everyone, which provided for a direct relationship between the user and the computer, between man and car. Precisely for this a personal computer.
A desktop computer (“desktop calculators”, so they were launched on the market – not to be confused with ‘calculators’!) Made in Ivrea that arrived overseas, up to the NASA offices: 44 thousand copies were sold for 3,200 dollars each, 90% in the United States, where this object is a success rarely seen before for an all-Italian product – but in Italy it is rarely mentioned.
P101, the Perottina
The concept behind Program 101 was absolutely revolutionary at the time. Until then, computers were huge machines managed by hyper-specialized dedicated personnel (in ‘white coats’, in fact). All other “non-technical” employees had no direct access to these large complex machines. The 101 instead wants to bring, for the first time, the power of the computer to desks, so that the computer also becomes ‘desktop’, and wants to do it by simplifying processes (and not just eliminating the obvious clutter of the machine). The P101 finally allows all employees to carry out even advanced operations, with a personal object, portable and accessible from their desk.
Italian Tech Stories: Olivetti’s P101, the first personal computer in history
This first human-centered computer, a real dream machine, was launched on the market with this advertisement: “Welcome to the world of tomorrow. You are about to take a trip out of this world into the world of the future ”.
Also, a beautiful product that fascinated Steve Jobs
Perotto strongly wanted the product design to be integrated with the vision and technological choices made, aesthetically and effectively representing the innovative nature of the machine. In this sense Perotto gave the job to a young designer at the beginning of his bright career: Mario Bellini, preferred to other Olivetti designers such as Ettore Sottsass, Marco Zanuso and Marcello Nizzoli, because he had really understood how to combine human and tech – and convinced Perotto.
The device is as small and light as possible, minimal in its design. As told in the book “Dreamers Who Do: Intrapreneurship and Innovation in the Media World“, Bellini was a point of reference for the acclaimed Steve Jobs.
Jobs, 26, participates in the Aspen International Design Conference in 1983, and there he meets the pillars of Italian ‘Great Beauty’: director Bernando Bertolucci (The last tango in Paris, The dreamers), the automotive designer Sergio Pininfarina (Ferrari, Maserati, Cadillac, Bentley, just to name a few), the Fiat heir Susanna Agnelli and, indeed, the architect Bellini. The latter was the one who – also according to Jobs – galvanized the approach to product perfection: Bellini described the centrality of product design and the imperative role of beauty. It impressed Jobs so much that he called him personally, repeatedly, to offer him to design new products for Apple. Bellini refused the opportunity, but it still influenced Jobs’ mentality, like the whole Olivetti company
A new human and democratic vision for the world tech
Perotto, with his inventions that placed man and his needs at the center, evokes a company philosophy that combines technology, innovation and humanism, offering a truly current interpretation to re-read and rethink the challenges that digital disruptions pose to all industries.
As Perotto’s son Pierpaolo, now CEO of FINSA SpA, declares, “the vision centered on humans and not on technology: having followed up on a dream, imagining that an electronic calculator could become a personal object, was an act courageous, certainly in total contrast with the culture and technologies of that historical moment “.
How does it really work?
I recommend watching this short video by Wladimir Zaniewski that shows us how a P101 actually works.
As can be understood from the simulation, for the entry and exit of data from the machine, but also for the insertion of the program and for the permanent storage of data, we find what was then a rather innovative technological choice: the “magnetic card. “(Magnetic Program Card). An ante litteram floppy disk: a postcard of flexible plastic material with one side coated with magnetic material on which the data was stored. It could be archived and read and / or modified using the reading / recording device inside the P101. The postcard, therefore, constituted a sort of “mass memory” for the machine.
The P101 represents an all-Italian dream, a totem capable of unleashing the pleasure of owning it, whose legacy was undoubtedly collected by Jobs who, quoting Bellini’s words, is “Olivetti’s luckiest heir: he built similar things , but Jobs did it in the US and not in Italy and this is the difference “.
The P101 is a story of a group of brilliant men who pursued the future and also arrived on the moon, starting from little Ivrea. Teaching us that, even starting from a dream, nothing is impossible.
Sources / to learn more
https://www.edizionidicomunita.it/catalogo/p101/
https://www.piergiorgioperotto.it/piergiorgioperotto.html
https://www.museoscienza.org/it/collezioni/oggetti/Olivetti-P101
https://www.inexhibit.com/case-studies/olivetti-programma-101-at-the-origins-of-the-personal-computer/