Quark Essay Research Paper Quark Incorporated

Quark Essay, Research Paper

Quark Incorporated develops software for use in professional electronic

publishing and communication technologies. Quark software is used by customers

to create everything from catalogs, brochures, and packaging to newspapers,

magazines, and books. Quark is also at the forefront as the communications

mediums move from print to electronic distribution

In 1981, Tim Gill found himself out of work after more than 10 years

in the computer industry. Not wishing to continue being rejected by employers

who did not need his skills, he went into business for himself. Since

he was more interested in software than hardware and since developing

software was a less expensive proposition, that’s where he started.

He founded Quark Inc. in his Denver, Colorado apartment. He named the

company after the subatomic particle generally considered the building

block for all matter. He also considered that a word starting with a Q

would stand out in lists.

Gill’s first project was to tackle the word processing program that

Apple had been promising for the Apple III but had not delivered. Knowing

people were anxiously awaiting this program, Gill spent 10-12 hour days

on a borrowed Apple computer writing the program. Three months later,

Quark produced the first word-processing program for the Apple III before

any other vendor, including Apple. The new program was called Word Juggler

and within six weeks Gill was able to pay back the $2000 he’d borrowed

to pay for its development.

Gill then set to work on a project he’d been thinking about for

10 years. In its original conception, Gill considered it to be a "very

fancy" word processing program. But Gill and a handful of his programmers

kept adding features until it suddenly wasn’t a word processing program

anymore, but a desktop publishing program. In 1987, QuarkXPress was born.

Quark was not the first company to present a desktop publishing program.

Aldus had introduced its program called PageMaker the year before. But

Quark’s designers were not concerned about PageMaker or Apple’s

requirements while doing their development. Instead, they contacted potential

users, like typesetters, and discovered exactly what they wanted in a

product. Their subsequent program contained many desirable high-end features

that appealed to a number of customers.

At first, Apple threw its support behind Aldus. Although this could have

been the death knell for Quark, instead of fighting on the same field,

Quark changed tactics. It priced QuarkXPress $100 more than PageMaker

and presented it as a superior product for companies that needed and could

handle its expanded features. The ploy worked and QuarkXPress began to

sell. Even smaller companies that did not need all of the features Quark

offered, began to buy the program so that they would be using the same

software as the larger printing companies. Over the next few years, Quark

effectively took the desktop publishing market away from Aldus.

In 1986, Gill, who preferred the technical over the administrative part

of the business, sold half of the company to Fred Ebrahimi, an experienced

business manager, who became president and CEO. Gill continued as Quark’s

chairman and chief technology officer. Under Ebrahimi’s leadership,

Quark expanded to include international operations by opening a distribution

and manufacturing facility in Cork, Ireland in 1988. By 1996, Quark had

customer service and technical support offices in Denmark, France, Germany,

Japan, and the United Kingdom. The office in Germany also develops client/server

and communications technologies.

In 1992, Quark restructured its growing company into teams, with each

team responsible for a single project and operating like its own small

company. In another departure from normal corporate operations, Quark

created XChange, a distribution and marketing firm that it does not own,

for small companies that build XPress peripherals. And Quark encourages

small companies to create these peripheral products, believing that any

programs they develop will only add value to QuarkXPress and open new

customer markets.

Also in 1992, Quark introduced a version of QuarkXPress for Windows,

expanding its market beyond the Apple Macintosh for the first time. With

the Windows-based PC platform in mind, Quark subsequently introduced Quark

XPress Passport which provided desktop publishing in 13 languages and

launched the Quark Publishing System.

In mid 1994, Quark was growing so rapidly that it launched a nationwide

search for skilled employees and experienced management.The successful

personnel recruitment helped the company become more departmentalized

and increased their ability to handle the ever-expanding workload. In

1990, Quark had approximately 70 employees. By the fall of

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