The company was founded in 1911 as the Computing
Tabulating Recording Corporation through a merger of four
companies: the Tabulating Machine Company, the
International Time Recording Company, the Computing Scale
Corporation, and the Bundy Manufacturing Company.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM
The reason why IBM still exists to this day while most of its competitors have vanished is because they have been able to redefine what IT means for IBM. That and some of the world's best managers.
