The Fall of Commodore

might make you go, does not compute. So join us as we take a bite that's b y t e into the story of Commodore as a business on the brink. Hey, everybody on Jonathan's trick Wine and I'm arial casting and this is a sea guestion by a listener, Crystal vander Least. Thank you, Crystal, Yeah, thank you. I appreciate it because it's right in my wheelhouse. Well, it may not be in my wheelhouse, but I owned both Commodore's and Amigos, which is the other commuter we're gonna be talking about. Yeah,

you're ahead of me. I never had an Amiga. I never had a Commodore either. I had a Texas Instrument trash e D. But I never had a Commodore. I'm sorry. The Commodore sixty four for it today was a really

good computer. Yeah, we're gonna talk a lot about that because obviously it's a big important part of this story, and one of the things we really wanted to focus on was the way this company actually had its fall from grace, which means we're gonna go real light on the history part so that we can get to the juicy bits. But it is important to know where the company came from in order for us to understand what happened. Yeah, So, to begin with, Commodore International was founded by Jack Trammel

in Eno as Commodore Business Machines Incorporated. He was an immigrant. He had actually survived Auschwitz and then after trying a few jobs in New York, whence he moved to New York, he moved to Canada and started manufacturing typewriters. Yeah, he actually got some money from a g I bill in order to fund that. And some other things we should know about Trammel that will become very important throughout this episode is that he was I wrote the line fiercely competitive,

but I don't feel that truly captures the spirit. Do you think it's too mild description. I mean, he he literally was one of the entrepreneurs who said business is war. That's like a direct quote from Trammel. He said that when you go to business, you're not You're not just there to make money. You are there to declare war against all your competitors, and your goal has to be to win. I mean, a little bit of that attitude can maybe be healthy, but not entirely. You're you're missing

out on key components of what made people like Pany. Yeah, and there's going to be some discussion about his leadership style, which obviously rubbed some people the wrong way. But at the same time he was considered truly a visionary in that he really believed strongly in innovation and trying to take the lead in the industry. So it's kind of

a double edged sword. Trammel. Yeah, but we're not there yet because as markets changed and the typewriter business got too competitive and two fears and not that he was scared from it, but he moved from typewriters to adding machines. Yeah. So what was going on was that the Japanese markets were starting to create typewriters. This was right around the time where Japan was starting to evolve into a technology

and manufacturing powerhouse. So this is you know, the immediate post World War two was about Japan kind of re establishing itself and then it sort of went full on into this manufacturing phase. And the problem was they were able to make the same stuff that Commodore was making, but make it less expensive, so it was very hard to compete. And by that we mean typewriters, not computers. Yes,

so we're not there yet. After adding machines, he moved to calculators and during that time he incorporated which was in and he went public on the New York Stock Exchange in nineteen sixty two under the name Commodore International Limited. Yes, and shortly after that the company wasn't a bit of a rough patch. It was finding itself short of cash.

And so one thing that Commodore ended up doing was selling a significant number of shares to a Canadian businessman named Irving Gould, and Gould would actually do that again. He would ultimately invest about three and a half million dollars into the company and then as a result he became a major shareholder in Commodore and decision maker. Yes, he would actually end up becoming the chairman of the board. Yes, but before then, when Commodore was working in calculators, they

were actually known for being a calculator manufacturer. They lost their supplier for the chips that go in the calculator and uh, Texas Instruments, and they actually Texas Instruments actually decided to sell calculators directly. Right, So now Texas instrument is making the competing product and it's taken away the

source of chips that were powering the Commodore calculators. Yeah, so Commodore found other resources for chips and eventually bought MS Technology, which was a chip manufacturer, and assimilated their chip designer, Chuck Pedal. And this is important because it's Chuck who convinced Trammel and Commodore to start looking towards computers instead of calculators, and specifically home computers, because at this point in time, computers are mainly for business. Yeah.

In fact, up to the mid nineteen seventies, you were not likely to find a computer unless you were either in like a scientific or research laboratory, or if you were working in a really big business something like a bank or you know, some other fine ancial institution something that had to crunch a lot of numbers, because up to that point computers were pretty big. They were like the size of a desk, and we're just getting to the phase where computers could be miniaturized enough to be

a desktop computer. And even then you had hobbyists who were interested in building their own computers, and you had computer kits that were coming out, but there weren't very many PCs that were being built and sold as a full product. Right, this is the very dawn of that age. So this is where we see pet Old say to Trammel, like, this is a market that's going to explode, and we can get in on the ground floor, and they did so.

In nine Commodore International Limiteds moved their headquarters to Pennsylvania, and then a year later they came out with our first computer, which was the Commodore PET Personal Electronic Transactor, the PET, the PET, and by the turn of the decade it was one of the top three computer companies. Commodore was at least among micro computers or home computers. Yeah yeah, yeah, Because I mean again, this was like the early days. You did see a lot of companies

attempt to get into this market. The ones we tend to remember really from this era would be Apple because the IBM PC would come a little bit later, and kind of radio Shock, Yeah, and Texas instruments to a to an extent. If you if you were around back then, you might remember them. But if you were, say, born after I don't know, five, then maybe you don't remember these other computers. Um. So let's let's talk about what was going on with this. Because they launched the PET.

The PET was not a runaway success for Commodore. No, no, Um, they were. They were one of the top three computer companies, but they didn't have a good marketing plan or good tech support. And you know, computer home computers are a new thing that are going to be bugs. Yeah, and if another company is known for being more responsive, uh and providing better support than they're going to start looking favorable. Yeah. So a year and a half later, Commodore dropped in

the ranks of computers pretty hard. Um. They did course correct and we got the VIC twenty Yes, which was incredibly successful. Yeah, one of the first personal computers to hit one million units sold. Yeah, they they hold the record for that, Like Commodore hit that benchmark before any the Apple too did not sell a million units before the and then we got, more importantly to me, the Commodore sixty four. That was my first computer that I remember. Um. I came out in eighty two when I was born.

That written knows my age now, but you know, I remember owning it. I remember playing Sticky Bear and Space Taxi and Kuala Pad and whole position. And I'm going to stop now. Um. Yeah. And one of the things that really set the Commodore sixty for apart was that not just that it was a very good personal computer, at least according to Arial's memory. I never got to use one, so I'm just basing this upon her ardent support in the notes, and yeah, I put down hashtag

bias not bias. Yes, the fact that you drew little hearts and puppy dogs people. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Anyway, they were both the VIC twenty and the the Commodore sixty four. We're both priced incredibly competitively. So the VIC twenty came out, it was priced or initially at three hundred dollars, actually less than three hundred dollars. That's Incredible's

like then you had the Commodore sixty four. It started at five dollars, and then they got into kind of a price war with the other computers that were on the market. So before long the Commodore sixty four is price dropped and dropped and dropped until it hit about one dollars for new Commodore sixty which is ridiculous for computer. Yeah, it also probably meant that they were barely making any profit, if any at all, because the profit margins are pretty

thin when you get down to that level. But this was Trammel's philosophy of business is war, and it meant that, yeah, we might not be making as much per sale, but we are totally the sales. Yeah, we're getting the sales. We're given the screw to all those other companies out there, take that apple. Yeah, they did beat out the t S from Radio, checking price, the t I from Texas Instruments, and Atari, who was one of their fiercest competitors, and

weren't going to get into that. And just a little bit Yeah that this story gets so juicy, It gets so so fun is the wrong word. It's interesting? Interesting, Yes, fascinating. So Trammel, like I said, was said to be difficult to work for. There were stories about him firing entire management teams if things weren't going well, if you felt

that they weren't weren't doing their job. And he was also known to really kind of leverage different suppliers against each other and try to make them dependent upon Commodore so that they wouldn't work with anybody else. He was also litigious. He would bring lawsuits against other companies, sometimes not even with the intent of winning a lawsuit, but rather just to slow down his his his competition so

that they couldn't beat him to market um. He was also known to occasionally pull a fast one on retailers. One of the stories I read was that he signed a deal with Kmart to sell the VIC twenty at a price that was actually lower than the wholesale price

he was offering to a computer retailer called computer Land. So, in other words, computer Land was having to spend more to purchase a computer from Commodore sixty four in order to sell it off at a markup than Kmart was even selling the Commodore sixty four in the first place. And so of course you can't keep that up for very along the computer Land said CIA. It seems like he was shooting himself in the foot, not building goodwill with the people who would sell his product, especially as

you're getting all of these competitors. That being said, they did sell one billion dollars worth of computers by and the Commodo sixty four, as we said in the intro, is the most popular computer system ever sold. Yeah, so you might think, well, how the heck could accompany that's dominating the personal computer industry, one that has has got all of the firsts, like the first to hit a million units, sold a billion dollars in sales. How could this company end up faltering? How isn't it too big

to fail? I mean no, but we'll talk about that right after this break. Al Right, So, like you said, Commodore was selling really well, out selling all of the competitors, but all of the price cutting that Trammel is doing. The suits were not happy with it, Yeah, because it meant that you had very low profits. I mean, yes, you had incredible revenue, but very low profits because that margin was so razor thin. And Irving Gould particularly objected

to this. He had been the guy who had, at least in his own eyes, rescued Commodore from certain disaster. By investing so much money. And so there was this fundamental disagreement between Trammel, who was saying, let's take no prisoners in march into war and defeat our enemies, and Gould, who was saying, let's not, you know, end up making

being number one at the expense of profit. And eventually you get to this fundamental disagreement where Gould felt that Trammel had led the company to a billion dollars in sales but would not be able to grow it. They're up to ten billion in sales, in other words, not if he kept cutting prices, yeah, it wasn't Or or if you did ten billion in sales, it wouldn't matter because you were selling it for less than what it costs to make it and you're just losing money anyway.

It's reckless thinking. Yeah. So there have been a lot of arguments on both sides about the fact that one side is wrong or the other side's wrong. A lot of people have said both sides were kind of wrong and that there were there were legitimate points on either point of view, but they were also legitimate shortcomings on both sides. The bottom line here is that you have these spoort of directors who have decided that Trammel can't

stay in charge, he's got to go. And of course he was the founder of the company, and so there's a story about the board meaning making their decision and giving Trammel the boot, and the way the story goes is that it happened pretty darn publicly. So there are other rumors about how Trammel was bringing his sons on. That wasn't a rumor that actually did happen. He had three sons and they had joined the company. But whether he was doing it to gain more political footing over Gold,

that's that's another question. Yeah, whether or not that was an actual concern or if that was just a perception on the part of Gould. But by the end of nineteen eighty three or the beginning of nineteen eighty four, right around there is when the board of directors decided that Trammel had to go. He had to he had to be forced out of the role of CEO of

the company. And uh, there's a whole story about him being at c e S nineteen eighty four, which happens in January every year, and that while he was there, he gave a presentation and you know, he had all these great things to say about Commodore in the sense that they had a billion dollars in sales, that's a huge thing, but that he was visibly unhappy while giving the presentation, And so the story goes that he had already he knew he was on his way out, but

then had to still go forward and give this presentation in front of the public, and then essentially a week later, the actual announcement of his departure became public news. Yeah, Commodore hired a steel guy named Marshall F. Smith to run the company, and Trammel took his ball if ball equals a bunch of engineers and started another company, Trammel Technologies, and then he bought Atari's consumer division, creating Atari Corp. Uh,

the parent company of Atari. Warner Communications only wanted the video game side of Atari, which is what most people are familiar with. Right. We will have to do a full episode on Atari at some point. That's a very complicated story because, as you see right here, the company of Atari had been split into two. You had the video game side of it that remained with Warner, and then you had the personal computer side, which went to

Trammel uh. And it's also interesting that we see how Trammel, who had built Commodore up, was now determined to take it down because of this betrayal. He was ready to go to war against the very company that he had founded. Well, Commodore it was kind of on the same track because they bought a small computer company named Amiga million dollars and this gets so juice. Yes, all right, so Amiga had been trying to launch a personal computer, uh for

a bit. It had multiple failed attempts over the few years leading up to their acquisition, mainly from the revenue side of thinks, some from the development side, but a lot of it was revenue based, and we're about to get into that. And the merge companies became Commodore Amiga. But the problem is is that Amiga an Atari, before being bought by Arrivals, were working together. Yeah, so you had Amiga and Atari working on a project because the

initial idea was to build a personal computer. But then the guy who really was the driving force behind the Amiga found a lot of resistance to the idea of building a personal computer, but there was a lot of reception to build a video game system. So then he switches gears, and he's he's still really building a personal computer, but building a personal computer that's being marketed as a video game. But he's getting a lot of pushback for all of the personal computer type things he wants to

add to it. Yes, and then you had the infamous video game crash of nineteen eighty three Slash four, And now suddenly the there's no market to sell video game consoles anymore in North America. So now Atari is totally flipping out and like, oh no, no, no, we should turn this into a personal computer, which was what the plan was from the first place. Yes, but now their revenue was gone, and you had this complicated rivalry that was really messing things up because you had this agreement

between Atari and Amiga. Then Atari gets taken over by a former Commodore UH founder and leader, and then Amiga gets taken over by Commodore, so it became a very um let's say, awkward business relationship. Well, Commodore tried to sue some of the engineers that left for Atari Corps from Commodore to keep them from releasing Amiga's ideas once

they were working together. Tram Trammel counter suit because of Atari's contract with Amiga, there was a a loan that if it wasn't paid back, Atari would get Amiga's I p Yeah, So that was all coming to a head, right like, it looks like Amiga was not going to be able to pay back this loan. It looked like Amiga was going to completely get wrapped up into Atari. And then in swoops Commodore the essentially said hey, we'll

pay that loan off for you. Trammel, who has to accept the payment for the loan, suddenly sees this prize that was going to be his swept away by the company that had spurned him. I told you against Juicy. Yeah yeah. But all this time, while these two companies are fighting it out, Apple, IBM and Microsoft start grabbing

the market. Yes, so you have these two giants that are in a battle over Amiga, and meanwhile there's not a whole lot of progress being made on the product side of Amiga because all this all this corporate stuff has to get worked out, and so that gave plenty of opportunities for the other companies. This is the same time when Apple released its first Macintosh computer, the IBM personal computer was hitting the market. So now IBM was

actually entering into the home market. Microsoft was playing every side against every other side and getting it software on anything and everything that was remotely a computer. And so this was this was a bad time for Amiga because that that design had a lot of merit. Yes, yes, did I owned it an Amiga two thousand, which is later on they were working on the Amiga one thousand at this point. But yeah, it was a computer way

ahead of its time. And so not only were they suing each other to try to keep their competing products from going out before the other one, which you said Trammell did it was known for doing. Uh. Commodore at the same time, to try to get some money back from spending all of the money they did to buy Amiga, was releasing weird models of computers they were kind of

competing with themselves, like the C sixteen. Yeah, they started releasing a bunch of Commodore branded computers that were very confusing to the market because even Commodore was not really good at explaining what the differences were between the different systems apart from their different price tags, and uh, some of them were kind of underpowered compared to a lot of the other stuff on the market, and because it seemed rather directionless, or at least in part because as

it was rather directionless, there wasn't a lot of adoption, so there weren't a lot of people going on buying these systems. If you want to look into this stuff, we're not going to go into it because it gets

really technical. But the Computer History Museum online has a ton of stuff about the different Commodore computers that came out, and you'll see that there was a lot of there's a lot of stuff out there that could confuse the average consumer who just wants to have a working personal computer. Yeah yeah, Um. By the time the Amigo one thousand was ready to hit the market, they didn't have the resources.

During that time the st which was the Atari Computer came out, UM and Commodore Amigo once they finally did get the Amigo one thousand out, didn't really do a good job at marketing, and they were also late to the market, so they kind of missed the opening window for the holiday season that year. And then they decided not to put themselves on the same in the same stores like Sears. I think it was as as the

Atari Computer it or and then they also had bugs. Yeah, the Amiga one thousand was known for having some shortcomings as far as that's concerned, Like where it shown, it outperformed all the other personal computers of that era. Yeah, and that was largely in the graphics and sound departments. Like I mean, not a big surprise. The Amiga had for a while been laser focused into being a video game machine, and now it no longer was quote unquote

just a video game machine. But the things that a video game machine needs to do well, largely graphics and sound, the Amiga did better than any other personal computer. And I think that's a pretty solid statement you could make. I remember when I first saw an Amiga in action. I was because it was at the time when it was first was brand new, because that's how old I am. I remember being totally blown away because it's so left

everything else I'd ever played or worked on behind. As far as that the graphics and sound working man, I loved it, uh, And they had one thing, so despite the marketing issues and the sales issues, they were easier

to work with. A lot of people didn't want to work with Trammels, so he didn't get as much good software for his computer, and he had to price it lower than the Amiga because he didn't have as many cool bills and whistles, and the Amiga did outlast the st Yeah, so this was a case where Trammel's personality would end up being a drawback. You know, it's he he was very good at going up against competitors, but

he alienated a lot of people along the way. So in this in this sense, Commodore was in a better position, but it seemed like it was a company that didn't know what to do with its star product, and that story is only going to get worse. But before we get into that, let's take another quick break. Okay, so we're in the Amiga era. It's nineteen eighty five. What happens next? Al Right? So in five, Mr Smith, who is the CEO of Commodore, also an agent who was

going after Neo. Yes, he was really trying to make Commodore Amiga profitable again, so he kept payroll by nearly half. Wow, they had had losses of two dred and thirty seven million dollars that same year, so he was really just trying to pay off some of their debt and stay afloat. It seems like and then the next year they opted not to do the big electronic shows like c S that they usually showcased at again to save money and focus on development. But that the problem with is it

creates a public perception that your company is not doing it. Yeah. Yeah, So then we got a management change. Oh yeah, don't just by the way, would become a common theme. Yes, Yes, so Smith stepped down and we got Thomas Radigan who took his place under a five year contracts. So it's important to note it was a five year contract. Yes. Radigan did three more rounds of layoffs and cut a bunch of old and underperforming product lines, right, some of

those confusing Commodore machines we talked about in the last segment. Yes, and then he relocated the Amiga team, at least those who agreed to go from California to Pennsylvania. Yeah. The guy who was the the sort of the father of the Amiga J minor was not one of those people. Know, and these thing has worked. The company was profitable again. By the end of put people were not so happy. Yeah. Now, Ratigan really wanted to to kind of put some of

Commodore's marketing power behind the Amiga. He really believed in that being a possible way to stand out among the field of personal computers that were starting to proliferate in the mid eighties. Um And he also kind of oversaw the the creation of two different lines of Amiga computers. So you had sort of the low end and in the upper end, which is not that unusual. We see that all the time today in personal computers right now. Back in the early early days, like the Apple Too.

When the Apple two came out, it was just the Apple Too. You would eventually get things like the Apple to E and the Apple two G and things like that, but early on, if you went out to get a computer you got there was just one of each brand. This was sort of the birth of, or at least an early example of having the low end and the

high end of the same computer family. Yes, and the high end was the Amega, the one that you owned, the one that I owned that I love so much, so much, uh, and then the one for casual use, the lower end one, the Amiga five. Now, they made a very odd decision when they were building these Amiga is right, they did. Rodigan decided not to put the Amiga developer team on either project. So they had non Amiga team people building the next generation of a Mega machines.

Meanwhile the Amiga team people are working on other projects. Yeah, well, or just sitting around being upset that they're on the design team for the either way. Either way, they were upset. On top of that, both of these computers their development experienced delays and so they still were not coming out. They weren't meeting their goals for release, and Irving gold Yep saying hey, I had expectations they are not being met. So what is his solution to this problem? Well, he

hires a consultant to look at the company and suggest changes. Yeah. I used to work for consultants. I knew exactly what they do. So what did they do? They say, Hey, you need to fire the dude who's in charge. Yes, that's what consultants do. We call them the bobs. It's an office space reference. Yeah. So here's the problem. You remember what we mentioned about Ratigan and just a couple of minutes ago. Yeah, he had a five year contract. Yeah,

we're not five years into that. So getting rid of somebody who has a contract that says he's going to hold this position for a minimum of five years. You get into some sticky situations, specifically lawsuits and countersuits for breach of contract and in one nine million dollars and unpaid wages. And then gold took over Commodore Amiga for a while. Yeah, he became the interim CEO, so he's

chairman and interim CEO. Uh, the five hundred and the two thousand Amiga's would come out in which you know, they came out. They were great computers. But part of the problem was that all those delays meant that it was harder for Commodore to capitalize on their launch because while they were being developed, other computers were still advancing and evolving. I still would argue that no one was

coming close to the graphics and sound. I would agree, but you also have to figure since this is such a new area for consumers, they don't understand why they might need new, better graphics and sound in a personal computer as opposed to a gaming console. And it also didn't help that they couldn't run the same software as other computers. And so these other computers that have been on the market for a while and it really established themselves.

You had software developers who were dedicating themselves to making stuff either for the PC or for the Apple the Macintosh line. It's very hard for a developer to devote assets to making different versions of the same program for every single computer platform. So Amiga did not have the software support. Had a lot of video game support, but not a lot of software support. Uh. Then we get a new CEO in uh Mehdi Ali, who was someone

who had worked for Commodore for just three years. You've only been there since nineteen six before Gould tapped him to be the new CEO, and um he is to call him a controversial figure at Commodore is putting it mildly. Uh. There were employees who outright hated Ali so much so that there is a documentary shot. I'm not even documentary, it was it was like home movies shot by a former chief engineer over at Commodore, where in part of the video they burn Ali in effigy, and that the

things things did not go well as you imagine. There were a lot of complaints that Ali was a very highly compensated CEO, something like two million dollars a year, which was just you know, a much much larger salary than what the engineers were making and meanwhile, he didn't seem to have a vision that would lead Commodore to success.

So people said that it was a terrible case of mismanagement and that the executive team was more interested in pocketing profits than using the money to reinvest in the company. In fact, one of the things Ali did that drew a lot of criticism from employees was he slashed the budget for research and development, So it's this is a computer company. Taking away their R and D meant that they could no longer be leaders and innovation well, and

it killed them. By only UK and Germany were had successful branches of Commodore, or rather branches that were profitable, and on April twenty nine, Commodore filed for bankruptcy and transferred their remaining assets to trustees to pay off their creditors. Yeah, they essentially went into liquidation. So, uh, first you had part of Commodore, the UK branch, attempt to purchase Commodore International, but they themselves weren't really in a great position to

do that. Yeah, once a parent company goes under, then they're just basically trying. They're they're holding on by selling off old inventory. So they liquidated. And then you had another company come in in ninety five and they buy Commodore International for just fourteen million dollars. This is the same company that made a billion dollars in sales of a of a successful PC. Well in Commodore bought a

Mega for twenty four millions. So yeah, now you have the combined Commodore Amiga companies sold for less money than than common to respect for just Amiga. Well, this new companys com They split Commodore and Amiga, make them two separate companies again, and they try to grow Commodore really fast and it's too fast and they go into liquidation

a year later. Yep. So then where does Amiga go. Well, Amiga gets sold to Gateway two thousand and Gateway had these big plans for the Amiga brand and and all these things they wanted to do, and they didn't make good on their promises, and a few years later in n they sold Amiga to Amino Development. And since then Amiga has been in a nut of lawsuits, passing patents

around and eventually acquired by Commodore USA. And so you had another company, to computers that bought the Commodore brand in nine seven, they tried a few things, but nothing really took off, nothing really took hold, and so they eventually sold Commodore to uh yeah Ronemomo. Yeah, Rnemo Media. Okay here you're right, is yeah Ronimo. But that happened in two thousand four, Yes, in two thousand and ten

is when we got Commodore USA. So that tells you how long Amiga had been floating around, and they had plans to make computers using the Commodore and Amiga names again. And the owner of Commodore USA passed away in two thousand twelve, and since then it's just all kind of faded away. Yeah, so it's it's sort of like not with a bang, but with a whimper kind of approach. And you may have heard like there was a like a Commodore sixty for sort of an emulator that came out.

It was not that different from you know, the the NES emulator console, the tiny one that you can get and attached to your computers, got like thirty games attached to it. There was a version of that. There are also emulators online for some of these computers and computer systems. Their emulators that allow you to run old Amiga software.

For example. Uh so there's still a community out there, a passionate fans of these computers, and I think if you ever explore any of those communities, you will see sort of not just fondness and nostalgia for the machines, but also just a deep sadness for what happened with the company. Yeah. I think a lot of what happened with the company maybe could have been staved off. They might have had a different outcome if Trammel hadn't been

so cut throat. He had the pricing and the competitive side of business down, but he didn't have the relationship building. You need to make good with your consumers. You need to make good with the people who resell who sell your product or resell your product, and he just he didn't even make his employees very happy. So I think there was just a fundamental also mismatch between Gould and Trammel, and it just ended up being a problem that ultimately

caused Commodore to collapse. And this isn't to put the blame on either party solely. I think it was just it was just one of those bad combinations, like occasionally in companies see combinations where you get like the idea man or idea person, I should say, and then you get like the business minded person, and then together they do amazing things because they compliment one another. In this case, I would say that the two styles did not compliment,

They competed with one another. And uh, you know, I I don't know that the company would have succeeded with a different person backing it financially than Goold. I don't know that it would have done any better with Trammel just being in charge the whole time. I also don't know that it would have done any better had Gould picked somebody else besides Ali to lead the company towards the end of its life. Uh. Some people believe that Commodore was already too far gone even by that stage.

So uh, it's it was a tough thing to to see happen, because again, it was instrumental in those early years in the personal computer age. And if things have gone differently, we might not be talking just about you know, the the Microsoft Windows based PCs and Apple computers. We might also still be talking about Commodore machines. And I would be such a computer whiz. I guess man, I really shouldn't have put all of my apples into the Amiga basket because now I don't know how anything else works.

Spent all of my build points for computer nerd references on common or six. I mean, it's kind of how I feel about like using Microsoft Word to this day. I was raised on word perfect, so I I stole, I'm not the best at word and that's that's a ship that sailed like twenty years ago. Anyway, this was fascinating, it was it's it's one of those stories, like I said, that's just so dramatic with the politics involved in it and seeing how uh, these disagreements at the executive level

can really affect a company. And in some ways you can say that this points back to the same old story we've told a thousand times on this show, the whole succession planning and leadership changes, and how that's absolutely fundamental to making sure a company succeeds and once in a while it works out great and then very frequently disasters. But whether it's disaster or success, today's story has come

to a close. So arial what if someone wants to be like our wonderful listener today and suggest a topic to us, how would said hypothetical person reach out literally, they could reach out by emailing us at feedback at the Brink Podcast dot show that's correct, or you can also visit our website that is the Brink Podcast dot Show. You will find there an archive of all of our past episodes. You will also find a little more information about your beloved hosts. And this has been a fascinating

walk down the history of a company. Can't wait for the next one, So you guys, just keep those suggestions coming, because it's it's fantastic. We love that you are a part of an integral part of this show and we greatly appreciate it. And until next time, I have been Jonathan Strickland and I have been aerial casting. M Business on the Brink is a production of I Heart Radio

and How Stuff Works. For more podcasts for my heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.