The Charles Babbage Premium was an annual award "for an outstanding paper on the design or use of electronic computers".[1] [2]
The award was established in 1959. It was initiated by the British Institution of Radio Engineers, which became the Institution of Electronic and Radio Engineers.[3] In 1988, it merged with the Institution of Electrical Engineers (IEE), which later became the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) in 2006. Winners have been announced in journals such as Nuclear Power,[4] Electronic Engineering,[5] British Communications and Electronics,[6] and the Software Engineering Journal.[7]
The Premium was named after the mathematician Charles Babbage FRS (1791–1871), inventor of the Analytical Engine, a design for an early mechanical computer.
The IET now makes separate Premium Awards for papers in each of its journals,[8] named after the journal itself. This includes the IET Software Premium Award, the nearest equivalent to the Charles Babbage Premium Award.