The SRI ERMA Project

Introduction | Development Begins | The ERMA Computer | The Infallible Reading of Account Numbers and Final Hurdles | The Team

Introduction

ERMA revolutionized banking and launched data processing machines for business.

ERMA computer on display at a Bank of America museum in Concord, California. (Photo courtesy of Bank of America)

Few consequences of SRI's work are more noted than ERMA. The Electronic Recording Machine, Accounting, was a project sponsored by the Bank of America from 1950 through about 1955 to explore the automation of check handling and posting. By the time ERMA had run its course, it had made the automation of checking accounts practical and reliable. It was also a remarkable engineering achievement.

Quite simply, ERMA revolutionized the world banking system and ushered in the age of data processing machines for business.

In a 1996 presentation titled "Using a Computer—Episodes across 50 Years" given at the annual conference of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), David Allison, Chairman of Information Technology and Communications at the Smithsonian Museum of American History noted that ERMA was second only to the seminal ENIAC computer as one of the most significant developments in modern computing. Allison noted that "...ERMA’s principal users were data clerks focused on the information they processed than the machine processing it.  They symbolize a new generation in computing, defined in terms of users, not in terms of hardware...The most important innovation in input in ERMA was the MICR code."

In 2001, the SRI ERMA Team received the SRI International Weldon B. Gibson Achievement Award, which recognizes outstanding contributions by an SRI employee or group of employees that have had a noteworthy impact on the standard of living and on the peace and prosperity of society, and have added special luster to the reputation of SRI. ERMA qualified for this prestigious award through its two major contributions: the use of account numbers instead of names to process checks and balances, and the use of a magnetic-ink reading system that permits the automatic reading and computerized posting of checks in spite of the abuses they receive in the handling and canceling process. Both innovations were immensely vital to the banking industry, and became worldwide standards. Almost 60 years later, these standards are still in use worldwide.

Keep reading: Development Begins