Adam Osborne
Name: Adam Osborne
Known For: The Osborne 1
Born : March 6, 1939, Bangkok, Thailand
Died : March 18, 2003, Kodaikanal, India (Age : 64)
University: University of Birmingham
Area of Study: Computer Science
“The most valuable thing you can make is a mistake, you can't learn anything from being perfect.”
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Adam Osborne
Adam Osborne (March 6, 1939 – March 18, 2003) was a Thailand-born British-American author, book and software publisher, and computer designer who founded several companies in the United States and elsewhere.
He was an entrepreneur most famously known for the first portable computer, but also was an author who made a successful move into publishing computer books and software. |
Early Life:
Adam Osborne was born in Thailand in 1939 to British parents and spent much of his childhood in Tamil Nadu in South India, where his father, the writer Arthur Osborne. Osborne moved to England as a teenager and received a degree in chemical engineering from Birmingham University in 1961.
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He later received a doctorate in chemical engineering at the University of Delaware and took a job with Shell Oil in California, but he left Shell in the early 1970s to pursue his interest in computers and technical writing.
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The Osborne 1
In March, 1980, at the West Coast Computer Faire, Adam Osborne approached the ex-Intel engineer, Lee Felsenstein with the idea of starting a computer company that would not only produce an affordable, portable computer, but would offer bundled software with the machine.
Osborne asked Felsenstein to develop the hardware of the portable computer. Using the money from his publishing business along with venture capital Osborne found Osborne Computer Corp. in January, 1981. Following Osborne's specifications, Felsenstein designed a portable computer that had a case with a carrying handle, could survive being accidentally dropped and would fit under an airplane seat. The machine weighed only 24 pounds, had a 52-column display that would fit on a five-inch screen, contained a cushioning tube, and had two floppy disk drives. |
The computer even has an optional battery pack, so it doesn't have to plugged into the power outlet. To meet the small screen requirements, Felsenstein stored a full screen's worth of information in memory and gave the users keys that allowed them to scroll the memory screen across the display.
In 1981 Adam introduced the first portable computer the Osborne 1. The computer weighed 23.5 pounds and cost $1,795, just over half the cost of a computer from other manufacturers with comparable features. The computer ran the popular CP/M operating system(that came before MS DOS). Osborne was one of the first personal computing pioneers to understand fully that there was a wide market of buyers who were not computing hobbyists: the Osborne 1 included word processing and spreadsheet software. This was at a time when IBM would not bundle hardware and software with their PCs, selling separately the operating systems, monitors, and even cables for the monitor. |
The Fall of the Osborne 1
Despite early success, Osborne struggled under heavy competition. Kaypro Computer offered portables that, like the Osborne 1, ran CP/M and included a software bundle, but Kaypro offered larger 9 inch display. Apple Computer's offerings had a large software library of their own and with aftermarket cards, could run CP/M as well. IBM's 16-bit IBM PC was faster, more advanced, and offered a rapidly growing software library, and Compaq offered a portable computer that was almost 100% compatible with IBM's offering. Osborne's efforts to raise $20 million in capital to rush an IBM-compatible computer to market were unsuccessful.
Besides the severe competition, Osborne made several heavy management and business errors—difficulty meeting demand, poor quality of the production, overstocking, etc. The final blow occurred in 1983 when Adam Osborne boasted about an upcoming product months before it could be released, killing demand for the company's existing products. |
It is unclear whether this boast was about the Osborne Executive, which was released in May 1983 for $2495 and featured a 7 inch display and did not sell as well as its predecessor, or, more likely, the Osborne Vixen, a smaller portable that promised to offer compatibility not only with earlier Osborne models, but also with MS-DOS, allowing it to run software designed for IBM and Compaq computers. Dealers rapidly started canceling orders for the Osborne 1.
Unsold inventory piled up and in spite of dramatic price cuts—the Osborne 1 was selling for $1295 in July 1983 and $995 by August, the sales did not recover. Losses, already higher than expected, continued to mount, and Osborne declared bankruptcy in September, 1983. |
Further Contributions
After Osborne Computer's collapse, Adam Osborne wrote a best-selling memoir of his experience, Hyper-growth: The Rise and Fall of the Osborne Computer Corporation with John C. Dvorak, which was published in 1984.
Adam was a pioneer in the computer book industry. He founded Osborne Publishing in 1972, specializing in easy-to-follow computer manuals. By 1977 Osborne had over 40 titles in its catalog. In 1979 he sold his company to McGraw Hill for a rumored $3 million, using the money to launch Osborne Computer.
Adam was a pioneer in the computer book industry. He founded Osborne Publishing in 1972, specializing in easy-to-follow computer manuals. By 1977 Osborne had over 40 titles in its catalog. In 1979 he sold his company to McGraw Hill for a rumored $3 million, using the money to launch Osborne Computer.
Additional Quotes
Summary
Adam Osborne was an entrepreneur most famously known for the first portable computer, but he was also an author who made a successful move into publishing computer books and different software. His expertise in the field of computing shows that he is credible enough to be acknowledged as a Pioneer.
Due to his fluctuations in success one can undoubtedly see why it is that Adam Osborne can be considered an underrepresented pioneer.
Due to his fluctuations in success one can undoubtedly see why it is that Adam Osborne can be considered an underrepresented pioneer.
Sources
Done by: Adam-Ross Findlator