A Customer integrated system (CIS) is an extension or hybrid of the transaction processing system (TPS) that places technology in the hands of the customer and allows them to process their own transactions.
[1] In 1992, Bergen Brunswig, a distributor of diversified drug and health care products, unintentionally created a CIS.
According to the story, Bergen Brunswig decided to equip its sales representatives with a portable computer which included a multimedia product encyclopedia and customers' account information.
[2] The clients became increasingly interested in this system and in some cases even requested to borrow it from the sales representatives for their own use.
As a result, the head of Research and Development at Bergen Brunswig, Jim McLaughlin, came up with the idea of modifying the system so that it included order-entry software and to provide this new system to the pharmacist free of charge.