digirose
Exchange Works, Cheapside, Liverpool 2
Plessey Electronics, Exchange Works closed 1989 - part of the workforce was transferred to a small factory on Wavertree Technology Park (Plessey Crypto).
this building was converted to residential units but happy to note the exterior looks almost like it always did
NOTE: below is an extract from Wikipedia:
UK Air Defence
Plessey, became the Prime Contractor for a new UK Air Defence System, known by the Company under the name Plan Ahead and, from 1961, as Project Linesman. To enable the system to be designed and built without too much information becoming public knowledge, a new factory called "Exchange Works" was built in Cheapside in Liverpool city centre, where young employees were granted exemption from conscription.
Heart of the system, installed in a huge building in the middle of a council housing estate in West Drayton, was the computer room, occupying an area of around 300 by 150 feet (91 × 46 m) and filled with around 1,000 7-foot-high (2.1 m) racks of electronics, including mainly the XL4 computer, based entirely on germanium transistors and using a computer language developed at Exchange Works in the 1950s and 1960s. During this period the company effectively became the world leader in computer design... unfortunately, this fact remained a close secret.
The secure status of the factory attracted many other secret contracts and led to it becoming one of the major designers and manufacturers of cryptographic equipment. Exchange Works is now luxury flats.
Exchange Works, Cheapside, Liverpool 2
Plessey Electronics, Exchange Works closed 1989 - part of the workforce was transferred to a small factory on Wavertree Technology Park (Plessey Crypto).
this building was converted to residential units but happy to note the exterior looks almost like it always did
NOTE: below is an extract from Wikipedia:
UK Air Defence
Plessey, became the Prime Contractor for a new UK Air Defence System, known by the Company under the name Plan Ahead and, from 1961, as Project Linesman. To enable the system to be designed and built without too much information becoming public knowledge, a new factory called "Exchange Works" was built in Cheapside in Liverpool city centre, where young employees were granted exemption from conscription.
Heart of the system, installed in a huge building in the middle of a council housing estate in West Drayton, was the computer room, occupying an area of around 300 by 150 feet (91 × 46 m) and filled with around 1,000 7-foot-high (2.1 m) racks of electronics, including mainly the XL4 computer, based entirely on germanium transistors and using a computer language developed at Exchange Works in the 1950s and 1960s. During this period the company effectively became the world leader in computer design... unfortunately, this fact remained a close secret.
The secure status of the factory attracted many other secret contracts and led to it becoming one of the major designers and manufacturers of cryptographic equipment. Exchange Works is now luxury flats.