SCIENCE / TECHNOLOGY

Quick Pick: General Automation may have lost its president, but it hasn’t lost any time in restocking its executive ranks. The company said Monday that it had appointed John Howarth, formerly director of major accounts at McDonnell Douglas Computer Systems, to the post of vice president of marketing. He will report to Leonard Mackenzie, vice chairman, who has assumed the additional post of president after Tullio’s departure.

Howarth was optimistic about the company’s recent acquisition of CIE Electronics of Irvine, also a vendor of Pick-based computers. General Automation will begin producing some of the CIE products at its own facilities this week, and Howarth said the combination of the two companies would create the “critical mass” necessary to compete effectively in the marketplace.