Control Data Corporation (CDC) was an important manufacturer of computers and computer-related products from the late 1950s until the early 1990s. Ex-employees of Sperry-Rand Corporation, most notably William Norris, who became CDC's president and principle strategist, founded CDC in 1957.

Starting in the mid-1950s and continuing through the 1960s and 1970s, International Business Machines (IBM) dominated the computer industry worldwide. During that era, IBM's sales and profits were so much larger than any of the other computer makers that some pundits referred derisively to "IBM and the seven dwarves." Besides CDC, the other "dwarves" were Sperry-Rand (maker of the UNIVAC), Burroughs, NCR, RCA, Honeywell, and General Electric. In spite of IBM's dominance, CDC was able to find a niche as a computer manufacturer. Indeed, of the many startup computer manufacturers in the 1950s, CDC was the only one to survive as an...