The influence of the Cambridge Mathematical Laboratory on the LEO project

The background to the Lyons Electronic Office (LEO) project is reviewed and the ways in which it came about that a large-scale food and catering business, J. Lyons and Company, set out to build its own computer and later went into the business of building and supplying computers to others are explained. Some of the leading people involved are introduced. It is described how their interest in computers was first aroused during a study visit to the United States in 1947 and how this led to a close connection with the Mathematical Laboratory at Cambridge University and to the first of the series of LEO computers. The ideas incorporated in these machines are traced back to their origins in the Mathematical Laboratory at Cambridge. An appendix recounts Lyons´ very early introduction to computer programming.<>