Ambros Speiser

Who is Ambros Speiser?

Ambrosius Paul Speiser was a Swiss engineer and scientist. He led the development of the first Swiss computers.

Speiser studied electrotechnology at Eidgenössischen Technischen Hochschule, where in 1948 he earned his diplom in communications engineering. In 1949, Eduard Stiefel sent Heinz Rutishauser and Speiser to study in Harvard under Howard H. Aiken and in Princeton under John von Neumann; Rutishauser and Speiser became acquainted with the Harvard Mark III and the IAS machine. In 1950, the Institut für angewandte Mathematik of ETH could acquire the Zuse Z4, but there were no other commercially available electronic computers which were suitable for scientific applications. This led the Swiss to the idea of developing their own computer. Under Speiser's technical direction between 1950 and 1955, Switzerland's first electronic calculating machine, ERMETH, originated.

Speiser earned his doctorate and habilitation during the development of ERMETH, but began an industrial career when he joined IBM in 1955. From 1956 to 1966 he was the director of IBM Zurich Research Laboratory in Rüschlikon. In 1966 he left IBM to become the director of research for Brown, Boveri & Cie in order to develop the company's research center in Dättwil.