Ed Hasted has worn most of the T-shirts in computing. He was introduced to his first computer in the days before PCs were delivered by the postman. Having completed a course in Engineering Mathematics at Bristol University in England, he went on to become the youngest PC dealer in the U.K. The firm soon grew to supply hardware to almost all of the country’s government departments.
At the start of the 1990s, Ed set up a communications software house to write e-mail and groupware, pioneering the use of the Internet. The software was implemented by companies of every size. It was one of the first products to be sold electronically online. Ed saw products through from inception to release, brought in 80 percent of the sales, and pioneered the use of teleworkers. On a roll in the late 1990s, he sold out to a U.S. corporation.
Since then, he’s worked for Wang, helped run some of the largest networks in Europe, organized the system builds for London’s Metropolitan Police Department, and instigated best practices in Internet Operations.