The Origin of Minitab's Name

Minitab Statistical Software was first developed in 1972 at The Pennsylvania State University by Dr. Thomas A. Ryan, Jr., Dr. Barbara F. Ryan, and Dr. Brian L. Joiner. Their goal was to incorporate the use of computers into teaching college statistics courses.

The name Minitab was derived from OMNITAB, a high-level spreadsheet for statistical analysis created by the National Institute of Standards and Technology's Statistical Engineering Division and maintained by them until 1986. OMNITAB performed many different statistical analyses, arithmetic and trigonometric calculations, and matrix and array operations, and Drs. Ryan, Joiner and Ryan initially saw Minitab as a scaled-down version of this NIST package.

Because students could use Minitab to quickly perform statistical calculations rather than doing them "by hand" on electronic calculators, it freed them to concentrate on learning what really mattered—the statistical concepts.

Today, Minitab is now used at 4,000 colleges worldwide. More students have been taught statistics using Minitab than any other statistical package.

Minitab also has become the leading software businesses use to improve their processes and the design and manufacture of their products. Minitab is used extensively by such companies as GE, 3M, Ford, Samsung, Toshiba, and DuPont and is recommended to the clients of most major quality improvement consulting organizations.

Minitab operates offices in State College, Pennsylvania, United States; Coventry, England; Paris, France; and Sydney, Australia.

Looking for other information or materials? Please contact Minitab's Marketing Department at PublicRelations@minitab.com