The CV

of prospectuses and circulars to share holders, corporate governance and yellow book requirements, stock market analysts’ meetings, litigation, television advertising, accepting hospitality to lunches and dinners with the Prime Minster, Prince of Wales, her Majesty the Queen and Prince Philip. Gained experience of dealing with the media, charitable work, the importance of liability insurance, employment liability laws, the need for protection of patents and intellectual property. Entered the Real Estate market.
1979 – Engaged with Kleinwort Benson, Touche Ross and Herbert Smith, gaining first hand experience in numerous drafting meetings regarding the flotation of the company.
1980 – On 10th April renamed the company Amstrad Plc and floated it on the London Stock Market. Sold 25% of its shares for £2m – a better deal than selling 75% to Laskys for £2m.
1984 – Moved headquarters of the company to Brentwood Essex and built a new 400,000 sq ft factory in Shoeburyness Essex for production of hi-fi racked tower systems.
1984 – Launched first Amstrad Computer, the CPC464. Opened subsidiaries in Paris and Hong Kong.
1984 – Awarded Guardian Young Businessman of the Year at the Mansion House ceremony.
1985 – Launched the Amstrad word processor PCW8256.
1985 – Bought the rights to Sinclair Computers from Clive Sinclair (to prevent his company being placed in liquidation by Barclays Bank). [ 1985: Lord Sugar is taking tea with Stanley Kalms ].
1985 – Set up Amsprop Ltd, a real estate company owning commercial properties, as a diversification from too much dependence on the electronics industry.
1986 – Launched Amstrad IBM compatible computer PC1512. Agreed terms with Managing Director of IBM UK for a licence to produce compatibles (not the same man who failed to hire me in 1963!). Agreed terms with Bill Gates for Microsoft MSDOS licence.
1986 – Launched advertising and designed the PC1512 campaign with the slogan, ‘Compatible with you know who – Priced as only we know how’.
1986 – Invited to private lunch for 6 guests with the Queen and Prince Philip.
1986 – Formation of The Alan Sugar Charitable Foundation.
1987 – Opened subsidiaries in Madrid, Brussels, Frankfurt, Sydney, Dallas and Milan. Achieved 30% of total European market for PCs.
1988 – Led government’s Single European Market advertising campaign for DTI.
1988 – Engaged with Rupert Murdoch for the launch of Sky Television by undertaking to produce the equipment needed to receive the service, thus offering British consumers (for £199) the opportunity to view 16 new TV channels. Hitherto there had been only 4 terrestrial channels available.
1988 – Honoured by City of London University as a Doctor of Science.
1989 – Launched satellite receivers for the European Astra footprint, covering Germany.
    1990 – 1999:
Gained experience in the world of professional football, high level litigation, speaking events at the Oxford Union, Cambridge Union and other universities and schools, as well as to the business community. Was responsible for exposing corruption in the football industry and was engaged to write for several national newspapers on various topics.
1991 – Rescued Tottenham Hotspur Football Club to avoid bankruptcy.
1993 – Engaged in high profile court action where football corruption was core to the proceedings. Introduced the phrases ‘bung’ and ‘Carlos Kickaball’ into common usage in respect of football corruption and the influx of foreign players.
1994 – Acquired Viglen Computers Ltd, suppliers to schools and universities as well as to government departments.
1995 – Acquired Dancall Radio, a mobile phone manufacturer in Denmark for £6m, and made further investment of £10m for new designs, plant and equipment.
1996 – Launched the first dual-band mobile phone at Hanover Fair to the amazement of the then market leaders Ericsson and Nokia.
1996 – Involved in litigation against American Hard Disc Drive manufacturers to recover damages suffered by Amstrad due to defective drives.
1997 – On my 50th birthday (24th March), sold Dancall to Bosch Germany for US$150m, Dancall having been purchased just 2 years before at £6m.
1997 – Amstrad Plc, by way of a Scheme of Arrangement, was broken up with substantiation amount of cash returned to shareholders, and new shares issued to shareholders in ex-subsidiaries Viglen Plc and Betacom Plc (which changed its name to Amstrad) as well as entitlement to any