Fredrik Rosing Bull

Fredrik Rosing Bull was a Norwegian scientist and information technology pioneer, known for his work on improved punched card machines. He was born in Kristiania (Oslo, Norway) in 1882, as the eighth of fifteen children. He had a passion for technology and science, and graduated as a civil engineer from the Technical School of Kristiania in 1907. He worked in insurance and heating installations, before he was hired by Storebrand in 1916, where he developed an interest for punched card technology. He invented his own machine, which was superior to Herman Hollerith's device, the precursor to the IBM punched card machine. He obtained a patent for his machine in 1919, and prepared a team that took over the implementation of the machine at Storebrand in 1921. He left Storebrand in 1922 to start his own company, and continued to improve his machine, which became a success throughout Europe. He was diagnosed with cancer in 1924 and died in 1925 at the age of 42. His patents were later sold in 1931 and constituted the basis for the founding of the French company Groupe Bull, a large information technology company operating in over 100 countries.