UK: An open-minded approach - OPEN SYSTEMS.

The open systems manufacturers are taking over from those hooked on hardware.

Information technology companies that want to survive in the 1990s had better stop making computers. They may write software, provide technical consultancy, or put together systems for special markets, but those who value their long-term future should avoid manufacturing hardware. "It is the era of the computerless computer company," says Peter Rigby, high-flying chairman of Specialist Computer Holdings (SCH), one of the first UK companies to have latched on to the idea.