The early microcomputer market had three kinds of companies:
- those with organic growth, where the sales of products financed the development of new products: MITS, IMSAI, Sphere, Ohio Scientific, SWTPC, Cromemco, Processor Technology, etc
- those that were part of a larger company: Radio Shack, Commodore, Texas Instruments and Atari-Warner
- those that were financed by venture capital: Apple
In retrospect, the companies in the first group were doomed to not become an Apple. Later on we got many more venture capital based computer companies, with Compaq among the most famous.
In the case of Sphere it had many more problems than just how it was financed. They got an early reputation for not delivering at all or shipping non working products.
What was special about Sphere was that from a technical point of view it was a generation ahead of the competition: with a built-in screen it was more like a Commodore Pet or a Radio Shack TRS-80 from 1977 than like the boxes with LEDs and toggle switches from its peers in 1975.
- those with organic growth, where the sales of products financed the development of new products: MITS, IMSAI, Sphere, Ohio Scientific, SWTPC, Cromemco, Processor Technology, etc
- those that were part of a larger company: Radio Shack, Commodore, Texas Instruments and Atari-Warner
- those that were financed by venture capital: Apple
In retrospect, the companies in the first group were doomed to not become an Apple. Later on we got many more venture capital based computer companies, with Compaq among the most famous.
In the case of Sphere it had many more problems than just how it was financed. They got an early reputation for not delivering at all or shipping non working products.
What was special about Sphere was that from a technical point of view it was a generation ahead of the competition: with a built-in screen it was more like a Commodore Pet or a Radio Shack TRS-80 from 1977 than like the boxes with LEDs and toggle switches from its peers in 1975.