- Person
- Alan Sugar
- Lived
- b. 1947
- Field
- Consumer electronics
- From
- British
The story
Alan Sugar, born in 1947 in Hackney, East London, into a Jewish family, founded Amstrad in 1968. By the early 1980s the company was known for inexpensive hi-fi systems, but its consumer electronics sales were levelling off, and Sugar wanted to find a new product to grow the business. He chose home computers.
Home computers of the time often came as a bare keyboard that had to be plugged into the family television and a separate cassette recorder, with a tangle of leads and power supplies. Amstrad's engineers set out to build a machine that would not take over the family TV. The CPC 464 combined the computer, keyboard and cassette deck in a single unit and came with its own monitor, which also held the power supply. The whole system needed only two cables and one wall plug.
The CPC 464 went on sale in 1984 at £199 with a green screen monitor, or £299 with a colour monitor. The Centre for Computing History notes that its low price and the fact that everything was sold together in one box were central to its popularity. It was designed to compete with the Commodore 64 and the Sinclair ZX Spectrum.
The machine came with Locomotive BASIC, a built-in programming language that gave easy access to the computer's sound and graphics without the obscure commands other machines required. That made it a friendly place for young people to learn to write their own programs and games. The Computer History Museum notes that it was popular in the UK, France, Spain and Germany for general home computing, and especially for games.
The CPC range went on to sell more than 3 million units over its lifetime. In homes across Britain and Europe it gave families an affordable, ready-to-use machine on which children could play, experiment and learn to program.
Why it matters
By selling a complete, affordable computer in one box, Amstrad helped bring computing and programming into ordinary homes across Britain and Europe in the 1980s.
About Alan Sugar
Hackney tailor’s son who founded Amstrad and put affordable home computers and word processors into millions of British homes, then gave generously to Jewish Care and children’s causes.
More about Alan Sugar
Sources
- Amstrad CPC 464 Wikipedia
- Amstrad CPC 464 Centre for Computing History
- CPC 464 Microcomputer Computer History Museum
Another act of tikkun olam. This is part of tikkun olam, the Jewish idea of repairing the world, and every one of us can add to it.