Today in 1972, Atari, Inc. a pioneer in arcade games, home video game consoles, and home computers, is founded by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney.
Harry McCracken in “Atari at 40: Catching Up with Founder Nolan Bushnell,” TIME, June 27, 2012:
…if it weren’t for Atari, there might not have been an Apple, at least in the form we know. Steve Jobs’ first real job after he dropped out of Reed College was at Atari; he worked there off and on from 1974 until he and Steve Wozniak started Apple in 1976. His time there was the closest thing he had to a business education, and Bushnell–an idea machine and a showman as much as a technologist–was a role model…
Atari was also a prototype for Apple and other Silicon Valley startups in another way: It boomed despite Bushnell’s youth, inexperience and lack of resources…. “Atari showed that young people could start big companies,” Bushnell argues. “Without that example, it would have been harder for Jobs and Bill Gates, and people who came after them, to do what they did.”