Risky Business - Kick Off Keynote for Trustmarque
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A 45 minute whistle-stop tour through my 'career' covering early 8-bit gaming development successes, failures and lessons learned from a teenager. Some pointers on how to change one thing at a time in businesses large and small. All combined with some lessons learned from risk management in high adrenaline aviation. A warmly received punchy nostalgic look over a varied 30 years from teenager to 45 year old innovator, developer and innovator.
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Risky Business - Kick Off Keynote for Trustmarque
- 2. “Risky Business” Mungo Leir ‘Pilot, publisher, innovator, one-time millionaire and pauper’
- 3. ACORN BBC MICRO DECEMBER 1982
- 6. JANUARY 1983
- 8. CONVENIENCE
- 10. SINCLAIR QL 1984
- 17. £2,500
- 18. ATARI ST 1985
- 21. ATARI ST 1985
- 23. PERSONAL COMPUTER WORLD SHOW SEPTEMBER 1985
- 26. PERSONAL COMPUTER WORLD SHOW SEPTEMBER 1985
- 28. LOGISTICS
- 29. “Paradox were one of the first companies to release any game on the ST with Mission Mouse which ran in mono only. I never saw a finished copy but what I did see only really came into the 'alright' category. Nothing else seemed to happen for a year and then, suddenly, at the PCW show in 1986 Paradox leapt out with no less than six ST games all in glorious colour and with midi-compatible sound to boot!”
- 34. PARTNER WISELY
- 40. CAN YOU DELIVER THE REQUIREMENTS?
- 44. SINK OR SWIM (Distribution and re-selling) 1990-1995
- 45. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Speedball II Kick Off Sensible Soccer Lemmings Dungeon Master Worms Championship Manager Golden Axe Bubble Bobble
- 46. And…
- 50. GRAFT & SELL (until the next opportunity comes along)
- 53. 1995
- 55. WIFE
- 56. TODAY NEWSPAPER - 1993
- 58. INCOME IS GOOD (especially if you are married)
- 61. OWNERSHIP IS BETTTER (AS IS HINDSIGHT)
- 63. instant access
- 64. Encrypted content on CD-ROM. First non-channel sale of Microsoft products in the world.
- 65. OLD WARDEN AIRFIELD - 1995
- 66. OLD WARDEN AIRFIELD FLIGHT SIMULATOR 95
- 71. 1995 - 2005
- 75. THE PERFECT MARKET No viable competition Cheap to develop High spending hobby Selling on back of Microsoft
- 76. THREE YEARS THREE STAFF £3,000,000 SALES (Just Flight)
- 78. THE DOWNSIDES OF MICROSOFT
- 79. EVERY TWO YEARS GROUND ZERO
- 81. CHANGE ONE THING (It works at home too)
- 82. 2006 -
- 88. CHANGE ONE THING (It works in the office too)
- 89. TODAY NEWSPAPER - 1993
- 90. FREEDOM
- 92. CHALLENGE
- 94. EXCITING
- 98. REWARDING
- 100. FOCUS & SAFETY
- 102. AND SEXY
Editor's Notes
- Introduce myself.Thank you for having me.I am going to share with you some of my experiences from a very varied careerSome have been exciting, some frightening, some just unpleasant.Hopefully you may be able to learn from what went well and also what didn’t.PAUSE
- You saw the peak of aerobatic aviation techology with the aircraft being flown at the start – an Extra 300, built in small numbers in Germany and used for “unlimited” aerobatics (+10/-10G and no G suits)Take you back to where it all started 30 years ago…. The peak of home computer technology with two teenage boys writing their first game.….The‘BBC’ computer used in schools.32k memoryImprovement on 1k from ZX81 a few years before. Given one for Christmas by my step-father. He tried to use it for business.Spent two weeks with a school chum creating a sophisticated platform game.Expensive and for its time powerful. Amazing sound and colour graphics as you saw
- Decided to sell it.This is our business plan.Basically who was nearest to get to on in London on the tube.Visions Software.Rang them up and told to come in next week. We said we had school so persuaded them to see us that day.#They signed the game.
- This is what it looks like.We got £1000.
- We were on our way to being millionaires.
- Earliest lesson in business was CONVENIENCESome cynics might say it is laziness.But we all like things when it is easy and doesn’t require much work.We went on to write games over the summer holidays for Visions for a variety of computers like Commodore 64, BBC and ZX Spectrum.Never achieved the riches of some. But it beat a paper round in the rain…
- A year later this chap came along with a quantum leap in technology.
- Clive Sinclair launched the first 16-bit computer.It was amazing. I was always suspicious of the MicroDrive technology.With my school chum we wrote our first 16 bit game. QL Caverns.We sold it to Clive Sinclair.We were going to be rich!
- This is what it looked like.
- And we all know what happened to Clive Sinclair shortly after.We never got the promised royalties.
- Because it turned out we never asked for a royalty report or for payment as we were too embarrassed to ask.
- Next year the giants of American arcade machines and home computers announced the first 32 bit home computer.512k of RAM over 32kIt’s actually frightening to think that the change in technology, platforms and business was faster than it is now.Many people forget that Seve Jobs worked at Atari before setting up Apple.
- My school chum and now business partner said we must spend all we had left of our ‘profits’ from Clive Sinclair on getting the first development machines in the country.They cost £2,500 each.In 1985.
- You got this.
- Our £2,500 gave us 6ft high stack of programming manuals.They turned out to be utterly useless.
- We took them home from Slough to north London in this.50mph M4. Huge lorries. Friend’s Mum’s Morris.Our entire life’s work invested in to what was in the back!We hadn’t got our driving licenses yet!
- You got this.
- Huge down,You could open a folder, move it around. Rename it. That was it.No software at all.What have we done?
- Two months later we launched our first published products.
- Mission MouseDesk Diary (can’t find that one).
- Mission Mouse.
- We launched here.HUGE.We had an offer to buy the company from Jack Tramial who owned Atari.We knew we could do better ourselves.Selling software whilst at school. Had answerphone.Took orders to the post office the next day on the bus.Spent all night replicating and putting on stickers on disks.We were 17.
- Lesson learned about logistics!
- We did a lot more. We had long holidays.This is what one editor raved about from his first memories of computer games.Reveal packaging.“It’s an antique!”Negotiated the $100 asking price to $40 including shipping.Here it is.
- We never got paid for most of what we sold. They sold 10,000s.We got paid for 1000s.We were too young and too naive I think.Too many lessons to sum up with one word I think!University called.I went up to Bristol to study Botany. Spent every weekend in London. Thought Botany about orchids in the Amazon. Not really science.
- We got a call from EA.To do a project called Marble Madness.Our favourite game.Still have scars.
- Tell the story.Left Bristol.Got home and no contract. Nothing.
- No contractNo university
- Exactly
- Played a lot of tennis and made a lot of games. A LOT. Mainly some very poor arcade games for AtariGot very good at tennis.
- So which do you choose?Memorable line from Janko – We may not make the best games but we have made ten times as many games as you!
- The lure of publishing…Why not have the first course rather than the left overs?“How bad can it be?”Whenever I utter those words it usually preludes something interesting in my life!Funding was always a challenge. Even back then.Thankfully I had a former school master who had taken a very keen interest in me, as it were.He funded the launch.I was selling IBM PCs in the city of London – this gave me a car.Helped keep a roof over my head while I was setting up the publisher.
- 1988.Story about working for company in London selling IBM PCs.Buying all the copies in area .Then resigned the day this came out!
- Holding one job down.Developing three games.Aged 20.
- I was offered £100k for the company before we had released anything. I turned it down of course.God they were terrible games.Even the journalists wouldn’t take bribes to write something passable about them.
- Not long before the vultures swooped in.Just before my 21st birthday.Knew what I needed to do, just didn’t really realise it or believe it enough to do it.
- I was out of my depth.Company folded in a year.
- Nomoneyl
- You may remember some of the best games ever developed.And some that weren’t.
- P P Hammer we licensed to Disney to turn in to a Micky Mouse game.Dong
- £2 million turnover in second year.
- Nomoneyl
- Merged with major business software reseller and became a PLC.Went bust within a year.
- Exactly
- Asked to be founding partner in first text message to email bridge from my old school chum.When people didn’t know what an SMS was then.Best customer was the NHS with Midwives.“How bad can it be?”
- Talk about capital vs. income and risk.
- Talk about capital vs. income and risk.Could have had 25%.But had a wife!But…
- Company did well. For once my school friend’s software was good.Even my wife was happy.
- Talk about capital vs. income and risk.Could have had 25%But…Sometimes stable is what one needs in life.
- Talk about capital vs. income and risk.Could have been a millionaire.But…
- Could have had 25%And yes my wife asked me why I hadn’t taken the 25% rather than salary.Sometimes stable is what one needs in life. And a good friend.
- Started marketing to communities of gamers.Formula 1 nutsPinball WizardsFlight simmers
- Old Warden Airfield 1998
- Amazing realistic graphics!
- You might think that flight simmers are nerdy types sitting in front of the computer all day long. Pretty dull and don’t have much sex.That’s exactly what they are like.
- BUT!It’s a hobby market, but not as we know it.Modern Airfix
- “Just do it”
- It’s a hobby market, but not as we know it.
- Too boring and too small for the big games publishersBUT also low volume, low priceDevelopment a fraction of cost of most video games.
- Zero to £3 million in three years Outsourced EVERYTHINGBecame an expert in our market.
- Mark Penny said you would want to see a plane crash.Every two years the business ended.
- The market is still there. I love the people. The aircraft.There are 20 million still (though they do die – from old age, not plane crashes)
- Keep the same businessSame sales channelsSame peopleSame communitySame meChange the product or platform…
- Made it in ten days.Apple approval process. One-off. Twice.David Cameron has intro in it.100,000 visitors. Sold 100.Perhaps tried to change two things?
- Keep the same businessSame sales channelsSame peopleSame communitySame meChange the product or platform…
- Which brings me on to flying.
- Sky is the limit – literally.One love from school. Was getting bored with the same old business after ten years.But loved the people, loved the aircraft.So got my license.School teacher who took such an interest in me!
- Always learningImproving oneself
- Took a year to get my license again.It then took a year to learn how to land the Extra.This is me after being allowed let loose on my own.
- Aerobatics.“The most fun you can have with your trousers on.”
- Raglan in New ZealandField too small
- Zero to £3 million in three years Outsourced EVERYTHINGBecame an expert in our market.
- Get to stand naked on WWII fighter aircraft.For charity, not a bet. (This time).
- Zero to £3 million in three years Outsourced EVERYTHINGBecame an expert in our market.
- Keep it sexy