Who remembers the Apple III? Probably none. That computer is gone down in history as Steve Jobs’ first failure. And those who have studied the matter argue that many of the problems that the computer had, and the consequent commercial failure, were the result of the design choices of the co-founder of Apple.
The May 19, 1980 at the National Computer Conference in Anaheim, in California, and the idea was to market the first Apple personal computer for business: in short, to challenge IBM on its own ground. The project began in 1978, code-named Sara, named after the daughter of one of the managers. But, in fact, it was Jobs who imposed some of the fundamental choices (such as the lack of a cooling fan because it was noisy) which led to an overall malfunction of the machine which manifested itself immediately. In the meantime, there was a sensational delay in the delivery of PCs to the shops, of over 6 months. And this was already an indication of something wrong. Then the malfunctions forced Apple to recall 14 thousand copies. In April 1981, the CEO, Mike Markkula told the Wall Street Journal: “It would be dishonest to tell you it’s perfect”, proposing a revamped solution to facilitate cooling. Not even an improved version, the Apple III Plus, changed the fortunes, and between 1984 and 1985 the two computers were canceled from production.
The other co-founder of Apple, Steve Wozniak, will point the finger at the company’s marketing department, which had influenced the design choices of the PC: “The hardware had 100% problems. Yet in that project we invested 100 million dollars between development and promotion. “Then in 1984 the Macintosh will come out, and Apple will take off.
Apple III remains track in a Disney movie, Tronin which the protagonist uses an Apple III to enter the computer system of a large company.