My “Garage Office”

I had worked in a large firm in the East for some time after graduation and worked in a small company in Silicon Valley later. It was a passing fancy actually. No, perhaps I had such wish in my heart for long. After staying in Silicon Valley for a year or so, I finally had the desire to start my own business, and the entrepreneurial impulse hidden somewhere in my heart was activated.

A video game called“Ping-pong” was launched, enjoying great popularity during those days. This computer-based Ping-pong game soon captured the heart of both adults and children. Atari, the company that develops this game was quite profiting, which stimulated me a lot.

However, no matter how popular the game was, its“life”was normally no more than 6 months. People were not fanatic with a game after 6 months, and they looked forward to new games with better quality.

The problem was that each time you developed a new game, you had to replace its game card. Currently, programs for games are software, once the software is entered, it can be converted into other games. However, it was not the case then and one card was designed for one game. R&D of a game card cost 6 months. Therefore, when a new game was launched, you had to immediately develop the next game card.

I decided to take advantage of this opportunity. I thought the problem of“one card for one game” could be tackled easily by fixing micro-information processing components into a game card. Thus, the principle of the game was programmed and inputted into the micro-integrated circuit block, so that any other games could be played without replacing the game card. That was, the original“game machine” (hardware) replaced with a“game program” (software).

I decided to take this as my career, so I started learning some knowledge on management and business at night. I worked in the company during the day and drove to San Francisco in the evening. I studied at the University of San Francisco for 3 months on how to run a small business, and quit the company then.

After graduating from university, I had a job in a large enterprise in the East, and later I moved to a small company in Silicon Valley. It was a passing fancy, actually. For a person with entrepreneurial impulse hidden somewhere in my heart, such experience served as good preparations.

Theoretical preparation was followed by field practice. I decided to start from a shop with little risk in failure. I made profits by selling chocolates and drinks to the children in the district, which prepared me with experience in operation and capital.

6 months later, about USD 9,000 was finally raised. It was really not bad since I had only a house bought with bank loans.

I asked help from Korean technicians who were also working in Silicon Valley. Although they could not offer any capital support, they could work together with me without interfering with their normal job. They admired my idea but put forward their concerns:

“But where would you open the company?”

“I'm going to start in my garage first.”

“what?”

At the beginning, I had not enough funds for technology development, not to mention an office. On May 15, 1975, in my home garage to the South of Silicon Valley, I set up a company called“TELE VIDEO”.

A“garage company” without even a signboard, it was unlikely to arouse any attention from relevant enterprises. I have even been subjected to insult like“How can we order products from such a modest small shop”. However, I still started in the dark garage of my cause which might result in the Butterfly Effect. In the near future, breeze from butterfly wings might lead to a hurricane in the United States, no, in the world of computer market.