Commodore chief resigns

JACK TRAMIEL, Commodore’s founder and the driving force behind the company, has resigned as its president and chief executive.

Tramiel began his business career by repairing typewriters in Canada and built Commodore up through the calculator boom of the seventies to its present position where the company holds 40 percent of the world market for low-cost microcomputers.

His decision to resign “for personal reasons” coincides with Commodore’s announcement of a record trading year.

It has become the first microcomputer company to report sales of over $1bn in a single calendar year. This figure — for the year to December 31, 1983 — is more than double the previous year’s total sales of $458m.

Commodore’s chairman, Irving Gould, announced that Tramiel’s successor has been selected and will be named when formal agreement of the appointment has been reached. Tramiel will continue as an adviser to the company.