Gavilan SC(1983-1985)1

First Smallest and lightest laptop in the world with inbuilt battery-featured with touch pad mouce,built in floopy drive,LCD display,full standard key board,weight only 4 kg,battery time 9 hrs-.yet it only survived in the market only 2 years.Read all feature of Gavilan sc-its rise & fall and the confession of its founder.

A great system years ahead of its time, but financial mistakes, and bad luck, caused Gavilan to enter "Chapter 11" the same year their computer was released; they folded in 1985.

The Gavilan SC was an early laptop computer, and was the first ever to be marketed as a "laptop".

The brainchild of Gavilan Computer Corp. founder Manuel (Manny) Fernandez, the Gavilan was introduced in May, 1983, at approximately the same time as the similar Sharp PC-5000.

It came to market a year after the GRiD Compass, with which it shared several pioneering details, notably a clamshell design, in which the screen folds shut over the keyboard.

The Gavilan, however, was more affordable than the GRiD, at a list price of around US$ 4000. Unlike the GRiD, it was equipped with a floppy disk drive and used the MS-DOS operating system, although it was only partially IBM PC-compatible. Powered by a 5-MHz Intel 8088 processor, it was equipped with a basic graphical user interface, stored in its 48 kb of ROM. An internal 300-baud modem was standard. A compact printer that attached to the rear of the machine was an option.

Introduced:	May 1983
Price:	US $3995
Weight:	9 pounds
CPU:	Intel 8088 @ 5 MHz
RAM:	32K built-in
Display:	LCD - 66 X 8 text 400 X 64 pixels
Interface:	standard keyboard touch-pad "mouse"
Ports:	video, serial, modem
Peripherals	optional printer
Storage:	Internal 3.5-inch floppy
OS:	Gavilan OS MS-DOS 2.

The machine's included software was a terminal program, MS-DOS, and MBasic (a version of the BASIC programming language). An Office Pack of four applications — Sorcim SuperCalc and SuperWriter, and PFS File and Report — was optional

It was far smaller than competing IBM compatible portables, such as the Compaq Portable, which were the size of a portablesewing machine and weighed more than twice the Gavilan's 4 kg (9 lb), and unlike the Gavilan they could not run off batteries. Gavilan claimed the SC could run up to nine hours on its built-in nickel-cadmium batteries.

Jack Hall, an award winning industrial designer, was tapped to work out the ergonomics, mechanics and overall appearance of the Gavilan. An extremely compact printer module was the result of a collaboration between Hall Design and CITOH of Japan. Additionally, several patentable features such as the unique display hinge and printer attachment mechanism were embodied in the design.

The Gavilan sported an LCD display with an unusual resolution of 400x64 pixels. It included a pioneering touchpad-like pointing device, installed on a panel above the keyboard. It used static CMOS memory, and came with 64 kilobytes standard. Memory was expandable through plug-in modules, for which there were four slots available (each 32 kb module cost $350 and included a backup battery); these could also be used for software ROM cartridges.

With standards for microfloppy drives still emerging, Gavilan was designed to accommodate both a 3.0-inch 320K microfloppy drive as well as a 3.5-inch floppy drive.

Slow sales due to the as yet undeveloped market for laptops, caused Gavilan Computer Corp. to declare Chapter 11 bankruptcy, owing to cash flow problems. The company ceased operations in 1985.

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The Gavilan SC has space for up to four 32K plug-in capsules of battery-backed RAM ($350 each), or applications software packages.

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October 1984 (NEWS PAPER)

The Gavilan Computer Corporation, a closely held manufacturer of lap-model personal computers, said that it filed for protection under Chapter 11 of the Federal bankruptcy laws in San Jose, Calif. The company, which a year ago began marketing a portable computer that drew acclaim throughout the industry, ran into several delays in introducing new models. The company also suffered from slow sales of lightweight lap computers, and encountered heavy competition from a number of other manufacturers. Gavilan officials said last week that efforts to sell the company had failed, and that all but about two dozen employees had been dismissed.

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Manuel Fernandez is the chairman and CEO of the Gartner Group, based in Stamford, Conn., a high-tech consulting firm that generated $511 million in revenues last year. He reflects upon his biggest business mistake.

(Like everybody else, I have made a lot of mistakes. But we all learn from our mistakes -- sometimes even more than we do from our successes. I made my biggest mistake when I was starting my first computer company, Gavilan, in the early 1980s. I didn't understand how important it was to have cash -- and I learned, the hard way, to regret that.

With Gavilan we had a brilliant business opportunity on our hands. By 1982 we had developed the first true battery-powered laptop computer -- years ahead of its time. We received lots of acclaim when we introduced our product, and we were sure of our success.

I hadn't counted on one crucial thing: cash-flow problems. To start Gavilan we had raised $30 million in capital. We had the opportunity to raise as much as $60 million, but my cofounders and I were intent on trying to hold on to the equity of the company. So we stopped at $30 million. Unfortunately, we didn't anticipate how much cash we'd need as we were developing our new product. Things can and do go wrong. For example, the manufacturer of the disk drives for our laptops went out of business. There had been only one company equipped to manufacture the disk drives, so we had to delay production until we could find a second manufacturer. Then, once we did, we had to spend another few months redesigning the disk drive so that the manufacturer could make it.

We literally ran out of money. By April 1983 we were in Chapter 11.

Cash flow isn't an area that many entrepreneurs are thinking about when they start companies. We're obsessed with revenues and profits and trying to hold on to the equity. But since then, I have always insisted that our company be debt free -- and that we have prudent cash flow. Now we look at it every single day.)