In 1995, ICI, officially headed Research Institute for Informatics, celebrated its 25th year of activity in the field of Information Technology in Romania, a country where ,as a matter of fact, many other important IT units, either recent or as old as us do exist.

What can one say about this lapse of time and, more exactly, about the importance and connotation of "ICI" as of today? This Report tells a lot. However, some explicit remarks will better orientate all those interested in such a history.

ICI has ever , no matter the hardships to overcome and barriers to cross, had and still has a significant, uninterrupted and protagonistic role to play in its field of activity, while managing to pursue its mission by quickly adapting to our own time particularities and to technological advances. ICI is most of all the creation of those who fathered it, of those who worked here and of those who work here now .

ICI attentively and obstinately strives, and always did, for an "organisation culture" where first comes the quest for the new and for marking feats (cultural, scientific and technological), and then the taking over of competitors, be the competitors long known or just new comers in the field. ICI is a public extrabudgetary research institution, of which returns come from national based or international based contracts.

The extent to which the above will not serve mere declarative purposes or express pure desires is shown by facts and "things done" at ICI. The facts and "things done" could be within the reader's reach if only having this Report read. Dr.

Florin-Gheorghe Filip

Corresponding member of the Romanian Academy

Director of ICI