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Merit History Merit has been a leader in networking and Internet technologies for more than four decades. Founded in 1966 by Michigan State University, the University of Michigan, and Wayne State University, Merit established networking in Michigan long before the term "Internet" was invented. Merit pioneered many of the practices and protocols used in today's Internet. In 1987, a Merit-led consortium (including IBM, MCI, and the Michigan Strategic Fund) won a $39 million grant from the National Science Foundation to re-engineer and manage the NSFNET, the first national high-speed Internet backbone for research and education. The NSFNET led directly to the growth of the commercial Internet. Merit Network Timeline: Two articles document Merit's early history:
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