The collator and the tabulator, shown here. For all this explosion, no radically new concepts evolved from the data processing industry from 1890 to the late 1930's.
Nevertheless some very significant technological discoveries were made within the communications and electronics industries which ultimately had profound effects upon the course of data processing.

In 1888 Obeline Smith made the basic suggestion for magnetic storage of data. In 1895, Poulsen invented the magnetic recorder.