Tava Corporation was a short-lived American computer company that was active from 1983 to 1984 and based in

Irvine, California Irvine () is a Planned community, planned city in central Orange County, California, United States, in the Los Angeles metropolitan area. It was named in 1888 for the landowner James Irvine. The Irvine Company started developing the area in the ...

. It was an early manufacturer of

IBM PC compatible An IBM PC compatible is any personal computer that is hardware- and software-compatible with the IBM Personal Computer (IBM PC) and its subsequent models. Like the original IBM PC, an IBM PC–compatible computer uses an x86-based central p ...

s. It also operated the CompuShack chain of franchised computer retail stores across the United States.

History

Tava Corporation was incorporated and headquartered in

, by Perry Lamba and Earl Perera in March 1983. The company's first product was a

coin-operated A currency detector or currency validator is a device that determines whether notes or coins are genuine or counterfeit. These devices are used in a wide range of automated machines, such as retail kiosks, supermarket self checkout machines, ...

personal computer that was a clone of the

Apple II Apple II ("apple Roman numerals, two", stylized as Apple ][) is a series of microcomputers manufactured by Apple Computer, Inc. from 1977 to 1993. The Apple II (original), original Apple II model, which gave the series its name, was designed ...

with a coin acceptor that allowed purchasers to buy computer usage time. Introduced in April 1983, this coin-op Apple II clone was aimed at the general public but especially public libraries, secondary schools, and colleges to allow children to learn how to use a real personal computer and for students to be able to perform academic research and compose essays, without having to purchase an entire

, which at the time retailed for several thousands of dollars (US$). The coin-op nature meanwhile prevented any one person from monopolizing computer time and acted as a monetization scheme for both the libraries and Tava, each of which taking a percentage of the profits. Tava's coin-op computers were installed in libraries in Southern California, including Walnut Creek, Santa Ana, and

San Diego San Diego ( , ) is a city on the Pacific coast of Southern California, adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a population of over 1.4 million, it is the List of United States cities by population, eighth-most populous city in t ...

. Each quarter-hour of computer time cost 50¢. In mid-1983, Tava established CompuShack, a computer retailer. By December 1983, the company had opened 20 locations across the United States. In the same month, Tava began

franchising Franchising is based on a marketing concept which can be adopted by an organization as a strategy for business expansion. Where implemented, a franchisor licenses some or all of its know-how, procedures, intellectual property, use of its busines ...

existing and new locations. In around June 1983, Tava began developing their first entries into the

market, hiring Gene Lu to help engineer these products and Faraday Electronics to manufacture its

motherboard A motherboard, also called a mainboard, a system board, a logic board, and informally a mobo (see #Nomenclature, "Nomenclature" section), is the main printed circuit board (PCB) in general-purpose computers and other expandable systems. It ho ...

. In October 1983, they were unveiled as the Tava PC, a

desktop computer A desktop computer, often abbreviated as desktop, is a personal computer designed for regular use at a stationary location on or near a desk (as opposed to a portable computer) due to its size and power requirements. The most common configuratio ...

, and the Tava PC 1, a luggable

portable Portable may refer to: General * Portable building, a manufactured structure that is built off site and moved in upon completion of site and utility work * Portable classroom, a temporary building installed on the grounds of a school to provide a ...

. Like the original

IBM PC The IBM Personal Computer (model 5150, commonly known as the IBM PC) is the first microcomputer released in the List of IBM Personal Computer models, IBM PC model line and the basis for the IBM PC compatible ''de facto'' standard. Released on ...

, both of these Tava computers featured Intel 8088

microprocessor A microprocessor is a computer processor (computing), processor for which the data processing logic and control is included on a single integrated circuit (IC), or a small number of ICs. The microprocessor contains the arithmetic, logic, a ...

s; the PC retailed as a barebones system, with just the desktop, for under US$1000, while the PC1 cost a little under $2000. Tava later raised the base price of the Tava PC to $1995 (~$ in ) while doubling the amount of

RAM Ram, ram, or RAM most commonly refers to: * A male sheep * Random-access memory, computer memory * Ram Trucks, US, since 2009 ** List of vehicles named Dodge Ram, trucks and vans ** Ram Pickup, produced by Ram Trucks Ram, ram, or RAM may also ref ...

and including a

monochrome monitor A monochrome monitor is a type of computer monitor in which computer text and images are displayed in varying tones of only one color, as opposed to a color monitor that can display text and images in multiple colors. They were very common in t ...

and keyboard. In June 1984, Tava unveiled the Tava Turbo PC, which upgraded the microprocessor of its predecessors to the

Intel 8088-2 The Intel 8088 ("''eighty-eighty-eight''", also called iAPX 88) microprocessor is a variant of the Intel 8086. Introduced on June 1, 1979, the 8088 has an eight-bit external data bus instead of the 16-bit bus of the 8086. The 16-bit registers a ...

, clocked at 7.16 MHz. The company sold their computers through their CompuShack stores as well as through other retailers. According to '' Mini-Micro Systems'', Tava were likely the first proprietor of a computer retailer to sell their own private label IBM PC clone. Between April and August 1984, Tava sold roughly 2,500 of their PCs a month. The company experience a slowdown in sales that June after

IBM International Business Machines Corporation (using the trademark IBM), nicknamed Big Blue, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company headquartered in Armonk, New York, and present in over 175 countries. It is ...

instituted price cuts across their entire IBM PC range that month. Shipments of Tava PCs significantly dwindled in the months after the introduction of the Tava Turbo PC in late August 1984, while the company had been spending between $60,000 and $70,000 monthly on its advertising budget. In late October 1984, Tava Corporation was acquired by Replitech, a distributor of computers based in the East Coast, who planned on keeping the Tava label while producing a broader range of systems on the low end of the market. In 1985, Replitech renamed themselves Tava USA Inc. and released a series of PC compatibles, from the low-end Megaplus, which featured a 4.77-MHz Intel 8088, dual 5.25-inch

floppy disk drive A floppy disk or floppy diskette (casually referred to as a floppy, a diskette, or a disk) is a type of disk storage composed of a thin and flexible disk of a magnetic storage medium in a square or nearly square plastic enclosure lined with a ...

s, a monitor and keyboard, and 256 KB of RAM; to the Sprite, which featured a

hard disk drive A hard disk drive (HDD), hard disk, hard drive, or fixed disk is an electro-mechanical data storage device that stores and retrieves digital data using magnetic storage with one or more rigid rapidly rotating hard disk drive platter, pla ...

. Tava USA commissioned

Advanced Logic Research Advanced Logic Research, Inc. (ALR), was an American computer company founded in 1984 in Irvine, California by Gene Lu. The company marketed IBM PC compatibles across that standard's evolution until 1997 when it was acquired by Gateway 2000. AL ...

, a company founded by Lu in Irvine, to manufacture the motherboards for both the Sprite and the Megaplus. Both computers were manufactured and assembled entirely in the United States while sold at prices rivaling those of the East Asian-built Turbo XTs starting to flood the market at the time.

American Micro Technology

After selling Tava to Replitech, Lamba founded American Micro Technology (AMT), a mail-order supplier of IBM PC compatibles, in 1985 with former Tava sales representative Art Afshar. AMT's lineup included the AMTjr and the XT-plus, named after the

IBM PCjr The IBM PCjr (pronounced "PC junior") was a home computer produced and marketed by IBM from March 1984 to May 1985, intended as a lower-cost variant of the IBM PC with hardware capabilities better suited for video games, in order to compete mor ...

and

IBM PC XT The IBM Personal Computer XT (model 5160, often shortened to PC/XT) is the second computer in the IBM Personal Computer line, released on March 8, 1983. Except for the addition of a built-in hard drive and extra expansion slots, it is very simi ...

respectively. In March 1987, IBM filed a lawsuit against AMT alleging

trademark infringement Trademark infringement is a violation of the exclusive rights attached to a trademark without the authorization of the trademark owner or any licensees (provided that such authorization was within the scope of the licence). Infringement may occ ...

with their aforementioned product lines, as well as claiming that AMT's use of the Chaplin Tramp motif in their print advertisements infringed IBM's creative direction for their own print advertisements for the PC.

References

{{reflist, colwidth=30em 1983 establishments in California 1984 disestablishments in California 1984 mergers and acquisitions American companies established in 1983 American companies disestablished in 1984 Computer companies established in 1983 Computer companies disestablished in 1984 Defunct computer companies of the United States Defunct computer hardware companies Defunct computer systems companies Defunct retail companies of the United States