General Magic was a company co-founded by Bill Atkinson, Andy Hertzfeld and Marc Porat that developed a new kind of handheld communications device they called a "personal intelligent communicator", which was a PDA precursor that stressed communications.
The original project started in 1990 within Apple Computer, when Porat convinced Apple's CEO at the time John Sculley that the next generation of computing would require a partnership of computer, communications and consumer electronics companies to cooperate. Known as the Paradigm project, the project ran for some time within Apple, but management remained generally uninterested and the team struggled for resources. Eventually they approached Sculley with the idea of spinning off the group as a separate company, which occurred in May 1990.
The company started to generate some buzz during that year, and by 1992 some of the world's largest electronics corporations, including Sony, Motorola, Matsushita, Philips and AT&T Corporation were partners and investors in General Magic. Apple also decided to re-enter the market with a project that eventually developed into the Apple Newton, and they decided to sue General Magic. The lawsuit did not produce a definitive outcome, however there remained long running tensions betweens the two companies.
The company floated an IPO on the stock exchange in February 1995 and the stock doubled on the first day.
Read more about General Magic: Magic Cap, Telescript and The Cloud, Later Developments
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