Get Autoblog in your Google feed
John Diebold, writer of the book Automation and huge advocate of using computers in business, has died
at the age of 79.
Ford Motor Company originally coined the term “automation,” short for
“automatization,” to refer to automatic handling of car parts. To Diebold, however, automation meant the use
of programmable computers to revolutionize day-to-day business processes.
While Diebold’s work
didn’t apply specifically to the automotive industry, but rather across all disciplines, ultimately we have him to
thank for everything from speeding up vehicle production launches (moving from clay prototyping to computer prototyping
was huge!) to things as common as accounting programs and human resources databases used by the automakers.