Apple's Forgotten Co-Founder

Ronald Wayne sold his 10% stake in Apple to Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak on 12th April, 1976 - having been a co-founder of the company just 11 days earlier. He received back his initial investment of $800, which would now be worth over $1 billion.

However, despite this often being cited as one of the worst business decisions in history, Wayne maintains that he made the right decision - because, as the ‘adult in the room’, his personal assets had been on the line had the burgeoning computer company gone into administration. 

In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly explore Wayne’s suggestion that he would have become the ‘richest man in the cemetery’ had he stayed on-board; check out his original logo - which looks more like a woodcut than an iconic brand design; and reveal a further disastrous financial calculation he made after Apple became a household name…

Further Reading:

• ‘Apple at 40: The forgotten founder who gave it all away’ (BBC News, 2016): https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-35940300

• ‘Apple’s lost founder: Jobs, Woz and Wayne’ (The Mercury News, 2010):

https://www.mercurynews.com/2010/06/02/apples-lost-founder-jobs-woz-and-wayne/

• ‘Meet Ronald Wayne, The Forgotten Third Co-Founder Of Apple’ (Inside Tech, 2017): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fWuCPsnWWig

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The Retrospectors are Olly Mann, Rebecca Messina & Arion McNicoll, with Matt Hill.

Theme Music: Pass The Peas. Announcer: Bob Ravelli. Graphic Design: Terry Saunders. Edit Producer: Sophie King.

Copyright: Rethink Audio / Olly Mann 2023.

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