The Sperry Corporation's Aerospace Division traces its origins to Engineering Research Associates (ERA), a St. Paul, Minnesota firm founded by William Norris (1911-2006) and Howard Engstrom (1902-1962). During World War II the original ERA group had worked for the Navy in an attempt to develop a computer for use in the classified cryptographic program. After the war, Norris and Engstrom left the Navy to establish their own company; in 1948 they signed a contract with the Navy to develop a computer system. This classified project was given the code name Project Goldberg and resulted in the development of the Atlas computer, the first computer with stored-memory capability. Much of ERA's work was directed at solving the problem of magnetic storage which was to prove central to computer development over the next twenty years.

In 1952 ERA merged with Remington Rand, Inc., where it became part of its Eckert-Mauchly Division. Norris, Engstrom and the ERA engineers, however, never found this relationship to be satisfactory, and in 1957 many of them left Remington Rand to found the Control Data Corporation. The ERA staff that remained with Remington Rand were then given a good deal more autonomy when the company established its Research Division led by Sidney Reubens. This division was primarily dedicated to the development of computer systems for military projects. Its staff worked closely with the NASA on many of the guided missile projects of the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s. It also played a key role in the space program. In 1960, five years after the Sperry-Remington Rand merger, it was renamed the Military Division, and in 1975 it became Sperry Rand's Aerospace Division.