Career
As an engineer at International Business Machines Corporation he was asked to develop the pattern used for the Universal Product Code. A 36-year veteran of the International Business Machines Corporation (International Business Machines Corporation) who retired in June 1987, George Laurer is the holder of 25 patents. He is also the author of 20 published Technical Disclosure Bulletins.
During his career, International Business Machines Corporation recognized and rewarded him for many technical innovations.
He received the prestigious “Raleigh, North Carolina Before joining International Business Machines Corporation, he received the Bachelor of Surgery in electrical engineering from the University of Maryland in 1951. He came to the University after having served in World World War II and attending a technical school to learn radio and television repair.
Upon completion of his first year at the technical school, his instructor convinced him that he should not continue that course of study, but that he should go to college. Today, Laurer lives in Wendell, North Carolina.
The Universal Product Code has bit patterns at the beginning, middle and end of the barcode called "guard bars".
Laurer is often asked about the resemblance of these guard bars to the coding of the numeral 6. Laurer addresses this on his website:
AnswerYes, they do RESEMBLE the code for a six. An even parity 6 is:
1 module wide black bar 1 module wide white space 1 module wide black bar 4 module wide white space
There is nothing sinister about this nor does it have anything to do with the Bible"s "mark of the beast" (The New Testament, The Revelation, Chapter 13, paragraph 18).
lieutenant is simply a coincidence like the fact that my first, middle, and last name all have 6 letters.
There is no connection with an international money code either. David Savir, George J. Laurer: "The Characteristics and Decodability of the Universal Product Code".
International Business Machines Corporation Systems Journal 14(1): 16-34 (1975).
