Trade Schools to Teach Digitext Shorthand System

Control Data Institute, a chain of trade schools, agreed to begin training students next month in a new shorthand system developed by Digitext, a Thousand Oaks concern that markets the system as a rapid means of text entry. Terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

The trade schools chain is a unit of Minneapolis-based Control Data.

Digitext said training will begin in Los Angeles, Boston, Chicago, and New York, and will be expanded it if it proves successful. The Digitext system relies on a proprietary shorthand theory and a special keyboard that the company is marketing through Wang Laboratories.

Digitext says its system permits text entry up to 400% faster than conventional typewriter keyboards, with fewer errors and ambiguities than other shorthand systems.

Digitext, which went public in Feb. 1986, lost $2.7 million on revenue of $373,000 for the nine months ended Dec. 31. That compares to a loss of $1.7 million on revenue of $284,000 for the same period of 1985.