Otto Müller (computer pioneer)

Otto Müller, January 1989

Otto Müller (born July 30, 1934 in Heilbronn ) was a German computer pioneer and entrepreneur. Together with his wife Ilse Müller, he founded the companies Computertechnik Müller (1972) and Hyperstone (1990). The founding was based on his own developments, on the one hand a 16-bit computer for medium-sized data technology and on the other hand a RISC - microprocessor for controller tasks.

Youth and activities as an employee

Müller attended a grammar school in Heilbronn up to secondary school , then did an apprenticeship as a radio electrician in Backnang and studied electrical engineering at the Konstanz University of Applied Sciences .

When he met his future wife in 1958, he was employed as a development engineer at Telefunken in Backnang . The TR 4 mainframe computer was later developed in this company . In 1961 he offered his employer the design of his first own calculator. A year later it became the almost finished computer "TR 10". He and his wife offered the "TR 10" to Telefunken, but they were not interested because the computer was judged to be too small. Only a few prototypes were built.

In 1963, the Müllers moved with the “Electronic Computing Devices” department, in which he worked at Telefunken, from Backnang to Constance . In the same year he accepted a job at the IBM Research Center. His wife followed him to the USA. In 1964 the Nixdorf Computer company from Paderborn recruited the Müllers back to Germany.

Nixdorf 820

At Nixdorf, Otto Müller developed his first commercially successful computer, the Wanderer Logatronic, from which the Nixdorf System 820 later emerged.

CTM

→ Main article : CTM computer

In 1969 Otto Müller quit Nixdorf and the Müller family went into business for themselves by founding the "Otto Müller Computer Engineering Office" in Constance. At the end of 1969 and beginning of 1970 the engineering office including all employees moved to Palo Alto in the USA to develop a computer for Dura / Itel. This commitment only lasted a few months, but it brought the young company a lot further on the way to its own computer. Back in Germany at the end of 1970, after a few weeks, the Triumph-Adler company succeeded in receiving a corresponding order .

TA 1000

→ Main article : TA 1000

Data station TA 1069, DB Museum Nuremberg

In January 1972, the engineering office completed the work for this order with the completion of the prototype of the TA 1000 computer , an 8-bit system. This calculator was among others

• used by the Federal Railroad as a front end to the company's own booking system
• Tax consultant Taylorix recorded the booking records of their customers on magnetic tape cassette and transmitted this to Datev via modem

CTM 70

At the 1972 Hanover Fair, the newly founded company Computer Technik Müller CTM presented the prototype of their own 16-bit computer, the CTM70. The designer Hartmut Esslinger also worked on this computer, and in the same year he received a prize from the iF, International Forum Design. In the following years, CTM expanded its product range from z. B. the screen workstation BAP70 or the Small Business System SBS up to z. B. to the client-server system CTM 9032 with BAP90 workstations.

1974/75 Diehl took over the majority of the capital in the company CTM.

Hyperstone

In 1989, the prototype of a 32-bit Hyperstone processor developed by the Müller worked, and they commissioned Siemens to manufacture the supplied layout in silicon. In 1990 the Müller founded the Hyperstone company in Constance. In the same year the E1 microprocessor developed under the direction of Otto Müller came onto the market (see Computerwoche of November 2nd, 1990). This was the first German 32-bit RISC processor. In 1996 a combination of a RISC and a DSP followed . The first serial application of the Hyperstone E1 took place in 1991 by the company Hypercope GmbH in Aachen on active ISDN cards (slot and PCMCIA). The Hyperstone E1 was characterized by its low power consumption (<1A at 5V) and the resulting low heat development. Its architecture concept and the resulting instruction set were groundbreaking for this time.

In 2001, Hyperstone generated annual sales of EUR 4 million with 16 employees. In July 2003, the Müller couple sold Hyperstone to the British CML group.

Honors

In July 1994 Otto Müller received an honorary doctorate from the Computer Science Department at the University of Tübingen . It was the first honorary doctorate awarded by this department.

literature

• Ilse Müller: Splendor and misery of the German computer industry. Campus Verlag, Frankfurt a. M. 1995, ISBN 3-593-35220-6 . Pages: 58, 65, 74, 86, 87, 88, 110, 111, 120, 125, 135, 251.
• Gabi Visintin: About Otto Müller. Computer Zeitung, 1998, issue: 36, ISSN = 0341-5406.

Web links

• David helps Goliath time online December 11, 1987
• The glamor and misery of German IT - for Ilse Müller Heise's 65th birthday online January 25, 2004
• computer.club2: Sharp PC 1500 and old computer technology accessed on December 20, 2019. In the 2015 film, it is alleged that Otto Müller has died. This was wrong at the time.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Computerwoche : Two ex-Commodore managers buy CTM  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. July 7, 1989  
2. ↑ Zeit online : The pearl needs a new version February 27, 1981
3. ↑ iF online exhibition: Computer System CTM 70
4. ↑ CML Acquires Hyperstone AG ( Memento of the original from July 26, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.