analysis - What kind of company is Initech? - Movies & TV

What kind of company is Initech in the movie Office Space?

There are a few important things we know about Initech that the movie plot hinged on. Are there any real-life companies that actually fit this criteria?

1. Initech hires computer programmers that "update bank software for the 2000 switch"


2. Initech has access to "the credit union software"


3. Initech has access to "the credit union mainframe"


4. Initech's accounting department notices when the money goes missing


5. Initech has a "Corporate Accounts Payable" department (although at least one transcriber disagrees with me and thinks it's "Corporate Councils Payroll")


6. Initech has a "Logistics" department


7. Initech has engineers who lack people skills sufficient to interface directly with their customers.

Items 1,2,7 make Initech sound like a software development house that contracts with financial institutions. Item 3 additionally makes Initech sound like a company that contracts with financial institutions for server and software maintenance.

Item 4 makes Initech sound like the actual financial institution.

Item 5 sounds more like a consulting firm, as I think "accounts payable" is more likely simply called "loans"; but an actual banker could probably clear this up.

Item 6 could probably be either a bank or a consulting firm.

I would think maybe Initech is simply a subsidiary of a large financial corporation, that does in-house IT consulting and programming for the parent company. But item 7 doesn't fit with this theory, as then there wouldn't be any real "customers" (in a traditional sense).

So... What kind of company is Initech? :)

Answer

Initech is ostensibly a software company, but I don't think it could really exist. I'll take your points one at a time.

1. Initech hires computer programmers that "update bank software for the 2000 switch"

   
   
   

   This would fit either a bank/credit union, or a software consulting company.





2. Initech has access to "the credit union software"

   
   
   

   Again, this would fit both. Programmers at a consulting company absolutely need access to the source code in order to make changes.




3. Initech has access to "the credit union mainframe"

   
   
   

   Access to the mainframe pretty much eliminates "consulting company." I happen to work as a programmer at a bank through a consulting company. There's no way any bank or credit union is going to give access to a consultant to run unchecked code on any system where it could cause harm.




4. Initech's accounting department notices when the money goes missing

   
   
   

   This also eliminates "software consulting company" from consideration. A consulting company has their own accounting department that would track expenses and income for their own activities, not those of their customers. The bank or credit union would notice the money goes missing, not Initech.




5. Initech has a "Corporate Accounts Payable" department (although at least one transcriber disagrees with me and thinks it's "Corporate Councils Payroll")

   
   
   
   

   This doesn't offer much information. "Accounts Payable" is a common accounting term that any company would use. Any kind of loan or purchase on credit would be recorded under accounts payable. A banker would refer to it as a loan, but an accountant (or accounting software) might still call it by the more generic term.




6. Initech has a "Logistics" department

   
   
   

   This could go either way. A bank would have a logistics department, but so might a consulting company that worked for a bank.




7. Initech has engineers who lack people skills sufficient to interface directly with their customers.

   
   
   

   Any company with an IT department has those. In programming, a "customer" might be anyone who uses our software. They can be internal or external to the company. In my department we call the quants and bank officers who use our software to make investment decisions our customers. Other departments write software for actual bank customers (people with checking or savings accounts). Many of us don't talk directly with our customers. Instead we communicate through a project manager or other intermediary.

Given all of this, I think your guess of "subsidiary of a large financial corporation" isn't far off. I think #4 would still eliminate a subsidiary company though. It's unlikely that the same subsidiary would handle both software development and accounting for the parent company. So in summary, Initech appears to be some kind of amalgam of a bank and a software consulting company that doesn't exist in the real world.