Abstract: Part I. The article discusses various aspects of the data service industry in the United States in the late 1960s. It focuses on companies that directly provides data processing to other companies using computers. The three groups of companies offering data processing services are data processors, software suppliers and systems managers. The Stanford Research Institute has predicted that software companies will multiply tenfold within 12 to 14 years. Customers of data processing have started cooperating to help each other. One customer cooperative is SHARE which is an association of owners and leasers of IBM computer systems. Some of the problems faced by the industry are personnel problems and choice of hardware.

　　Subjects: COMPUTER service industry; COMPUTER industry; COMPUTER software industry; DATA processing service centers; COMPUTERS; ELECTRONIC data processing; CONSUMER cooperatives; COMPUTER systems; UNITED States; Computer and Software Stores; Electronic Computer Manufacturing; Computer Facilities Management Services; Other Computer Related Services; Computer Systems Design Services; Computer and Computer Peripheral Equipment and Software Merchant Wholesalers; Data Processing, Hosting, and Related Services