# Keydata Corporation

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"Keydata" redirects here. For the financial services company, see [Stewart Ford](/source/Stewart_Ford).

**Keydata Corporation** was one of the first companies in the [time-sharing](/source/Time-sharing) business in the 1960s. It was the brainchild of Charles W. Adams, an [entrepreneur](/source/Entrepreneur) who had founded "Adams Associates" who were best remembered as the authors of computer equipment surveys during this period.

Keydata was located in [Technology Square](/source/Technology_Square_(Cambridge,_Massachusetts)) in [Cambridge, Massachusetts](/source/Cambridge,_Massachusetts) (later moved to Watertown, Massachusetts), where [Project MAC](/source/Project_MAC), the seminal venture sponsored by [MIT](/source/MIT) which saw the development of [MULTICS](/source/MULTICS) one of the earliest time sharing software systems. [UNIX](/source/UNIX) is a derivative of MULTICS. In addition, IBM's [Cambridge Scientific Center](/source/Cambridge_Scientific_Center) was located in Technology Square and this R&D center developed the first IBM [virtual memory](/source/Virtual_memory) system computer, [CP/CMS](/source/CP/CMS). This was initially installed on a modified [IBM System/360 Model 40](/source/IBM_System/360_Model_40) computer with the informal name of the "Cambridge box." Later [IBM](/source/IBM) used modernized technology for the 360/67 and, today, all modern computers use "virtual memory."

The coincident location of the nexus of time sharing and virtual memory developers in Cambridge resulted in a heady climate of information technology state-of-the-art knowledge sharing which Keydata profited by, although its [UNIVAC](/source/UNIVAC) computer architecture permitted only software-based implementations. At the time, the fashion was the idea that computer power would be made available on a network connection of a ["dumb" terminal](/source/Dumb_terminal) to a "smart" [mainframe computer](/source/Mainframe_computer) utility, sharing mammoth [computer](/source/Computer) power with thousands, if not millions, of users.

Keydata used a [UNIVAC 490](/source/UNIVAC_490) computer using drum (secondary) memory to provide commercial applications such as inventory management and accounting applications on a network basis to slow Teletype-based terminals in customer locations and replaced in-house computers and other services with its highly customized parameter-driven distribution and manufacturing applications. The online transaction management application was monolithic, written in a proprietary high-level language; it consisted of hundreds of thousands of lines of code. The application was highly parametrized such that it could be customized to each customer's requirements just by tweaking the parameters. New parameters were introduced as needed. Networking to customers consisted of private, point to point connections through AT&T.

Other seminal services were initially implemented on this service, such as [Instinet](/source/Instinet), a stock trading service now owned by Reuters which trades large block transactions on US securities markets, and a very early network inventory network application for [Shell Oil](/source/Shell_Oil) company.

At its peak, Keydata had hundreds of customers on-line. As minicomputers arrived in the market, Keydata tried to adapt their applications to the DEC's VAX 780 and the Hewlett-Packard 3000 series, but this proved impossible due to the complexity of the project and the lack of resources.

## References

1. ["Keydata Corporation"](https://www.ithistory.org/db/companies/keydata-corporation). IT History Society. 15 December 2015.

1. ["KEYDATA CORPORATION :: Texas (US) :: OpenCorporates"](https://opencorporates.com/companies/us_tx/0004515706)

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Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Keydata Corporation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keydata_Corporation) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keydata_Corporation?action=history)). Available under [Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Changes may have been made.