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Wayne co-founded Apple Inc. with Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs. At that time, Wozniak was 21 years old and Jobs was 25 years old while Wayne was 42 years old. That is, he was the most experienced person in this circle. He was given the responsibility of the company’s mechanical engineering and documentation and in return received a 10 per cent stake. On April 1, 1976, Wayne picked up the typewriter and drew up an agreement setting out the responsibilities of each man. Not only this, he also designed the first logo of the company.
Shares sold for $800
The company’s first logo was a picture of Isaac Newton. In this he was sitting under the apple tree. This logo was describing the event that inspired Newton to discover gravity. But Wayne soon grew bored of the company. He started feeling that whatever loan the company takes for the business, it will be on his head. Jobs took out a $15,000 loan to buy supplies for the company’s first contract. The company’s first contract came from Bay Area computer store The Byte Shop. He ordered about 100 computers to Apple. But The Byte Shop was notorious for not paying bills, and Wayne was worried that Apple would not get the money.
At that time, Jobs and Wozniak had no money while Wayne had the house as well as other assets. He felt that if something bad happened, he would be in trouble. So after just 12 days, Wayne got his name removed from the contract and sold his shares to Jobs and Wozniak for just $800. Wayne’s decision cost him dearly. If he had 10% of the company’s shares today, it would have been worth $290 billion. In this way he would have been the richest man in the world. According to the Bloomberg Billionaire Index, Elon Musk, CEO of French businessman Tesla, is the world’s richest person with a net worth of $ 230 billion.
second time unlucky
Surprisingly, Wayne doesn’t seem to regret his decision. He said this in an interview with Business Insider a few years back. He said that there were no special possibilities for him in Apple. He said, ‘For the next 20 years I kept looking at papers in the documentation department. I was above 40 years and he was 20-22 years old. To me it was like a lion’s tail. If I had stayed in Apple, I would have been named among the richest people in the world.
But they do have regrets about one thing. Wayne kept the original 1976 contract for many years, then sold it in the early 1990s for $500. He said, ‘Apple’s contract was gathering dust in my cupboard. I thought what would I do with it. In 2011, this contract was sold at an auction for $1.59 million. That is, Wayne lost the opportunity to earn money again. Jobs and Wozniak kept the Wayne logo for a year, and then the sliced apple company logo was created. Changes were made in this from time to time.