The corporation originated from a pre-World War I conglomerate of companies producing tabulators and chronometers. Gradually, it became an international technological colossus, became a pioneer in the development of electronic computers, and then, in the mainframe era, an absolute monopolist. Until the 70s, the corporation was headed by the icons of American capitalism, Thomas Watson Sr. and Thomas Watson Jr.
Today, IBM has a huge number of patents and innovative developments in a wide range of areas: punched cards, processors, transistors, storage systems, text editors, databases, operating systems, etc.