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THE PRESENT ERA: MANAGING CHANGE IN THE INFORMATION AGE 39 them in business. (An estimated 17 million personal computers were sold worldwide in 1984.] Thus, these machines generate a self-perpetuating demand for the technology they embody. Consequently, there is a great demand for engineers who design and configure computer systems; the 1970s saw a nearly exponential rise in demand for electronics engineers. A new category of product brought about by computers is software, which instructs the computer in a programmed method of operation. Like any other product, software is designed and developed before being produced for sale. Like many other contemporary products it is highly technical in nature; but it is based on computer rather than physical science (Jensen, 1984). The designing of software products has opened up a new specialty of engineering and is further broadening the definition of engineering work. Accelerated Technology Development Fueling the revolution in information products, and to some extent deriving from it, has been a great increase in the rate of technology development in general in the postwar period. Throughout the first half of the twentieth century, technology (whether measured by patents or any other yardstick) had progressed at a steadily accelerating rate. But in the 1950s, spurred by massive government R&D spending, by a vibrant economy, and by mass consumerism on an unprecedented scale, the rate of development climbed to new highs. New technologies spawned new technologies as the demand for engineering-related goods and services continued unabated. The fuller and more rapid incorporation of scientific advances into engineering education and practice quickened the pace of technology development. It became commonplace to observe that the sum total of knowledge was doubling at shorter and shorter intervals. The overall rate of technological change itself thus had the potential to exert considerable stress on engineering. It is pertinent to ask whether the engineering supply system in general, and the technology development process in particular, has adapted adequately to the high degree of changeâand whether it will continue to adapt. Global Business, Global Markets Since the 1950s, American business interests have expanded in scope to encompass most of the world's countries. Exports of raw materials, agricultural products, and manufactured goods continue to be a major
