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Iain Jones International Addison Mini A

Iain Jones International Addison Mini A
Rear

Iain Jones International Addison Mini A

Distinctive features: A model from one of a number of  U.S. companies that briefly entered the calculator market in the early 1970s. Has a battery-level meter.

Technical details:
Display is 8 digits, red LED.

4-functions.

9v (PP3) rechargeable, see photograph of the rear, above.
Has a battery-level meter, just above the left end of the display.

Main integrated circuit is a General Instrument C550, here date coded early 1973.

80 x 149 x 28 mm (3.1" x 5.9" x 1.1").

c1973.

Designed and manufactured by Iain Jones International , Ltd, Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.A.

Circuit board

With the casing removed, showing the Texas Instruments "Klixon" keypad, and the circuit board with the gold coloured GI C550 integrated circuit, which was a very common calculator integrated circuit at this time.
To the right of the LED display is the battery-level meter.

In the early 1970s the number of electronics components in a calculator had reduced but were still fairly costly. A number of small electronics companies, especially in the U.S.A., saw the opportunity of manufacturing calculators and making a profit. Iain Jones International Ltd. is one such company and, like many of them, little is known about it apart from a small number of models of calculator which turn up.
With the ever reducing cost of the electronics components and the number of companies starting to mass-produce calculators, the selling price of calculators plummetted and the profits from manufacturing them dwindled. Most of these small companies dropped out of the calculator business after a year or two.

This model is an interesting example. It uses the GI C550 integrated circuit, which was a very common calculator integrated circuit at this time, together with the Texas Instruments Klixon keypad, but unusually it makes use of a 9v PP3 rechargeable battery and is one of the smallest calculators to have a battery-level meter.

To see more calculators from companies that only produced one or two models see the article "One Hit Wonders" in the Collecting Calculators section of this site.

Hand-held Calculators

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