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THE PEOPLE OF ATARI

Nolan Bushnell the Father of Video Games

*Formed Atari in 1972

*Sold Atari to Warner Brother in 1976

*Pursued interactive robotics later with ChuckECheese

Photo coutesty LEN LAHMAN from the San Jose Mercury News

Nolan Bushnell founded Atari in 1972 with the creation of the video arcade game Pong and sold the company in 1976 to Warner Brothers for $28 million. Later he pursued robotic technologies with the pizza and gaming franchise company ChuckECheese. Nolan is truly the father of video games, and his innovations paved the way for affordable computer technologies that would beckon in the computer age.

Jack Tramiel Founder of Commodore and creator of the reorganized Atari Corporation in 1984

Grew up in Poland during Nazi occupation

Sons, Sam and Leonard worked with him at Atari Corporation. Sam was CEO briefly.

Pioneer in the Computer Industry; creating computers both with Commodore and later Atari Corp

Image Courtesy Fortune magazine, April 13, 1998

Jack Tramiel grew up in Poland during German occupation in 1939. During that time his name was Idek Tramielski. In 1955 he founded Commodore, an importer and later manufacturer of adding machines and typewriters. He took the name for the company from his stint in the US Army from 1948 to the early 1950's. He thought the name was clever, and commodore was a name not used by any major company at the time unlike the terms general or admiral. In 1962 Commodore became a publically traded company with stock shares initially trading at $2.50 a share. In 1977 Commodore released its first computer and used affordability as its prime selling point. In the next few years this strategy led to computer prices being pushed down to nearly $200. Tramiel once said in an interview with Fortune Magazine on April 13, 1998 that "Business is war, I don't believe in compromising I believe in winning." This pretty much sums up his strategy, TO WIN, TO WIN,and TO WIN. In 1984 Jack Tramiel was forced to step down from his position with Commodore. He later that year purchased all Atari, Inc. assets from Warner Brothers except the arcade gaming division. He reformed this company as Atari Corporation. He focused Atari's attentions on the computer market heavily and released the Atari 7800 home console system in 1986 and only after the video game market was heavily dominated by Nintendo. From 1993 to its demise almost all of Atari's attention was on the home console based video game market. Jack ran Atari Corp with the help of his eldest son Sam Tramiel ( who was CEO briefly) and his second eldest son Leonard.

Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak
the founders of Apple computer worked for Atari in 1974

Pictured is front of Apple circuitry Wozniak(left) and Jobs(right)

They worked as Atari game designers in 1974

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