So far Judy had managed to reply to enquiries about her software very informally. If people wanted a copy, David would arrange to record a magnetic tape and post it off from the Computer Centre. The software was well written and it worked. Everyone got paid. Everyone was happy.
After the publication of the article in Computer, she was overwhelmed by enquiries from all over the world. She and David went on holiday to Malta for a week and they ran through their options. They walked in the warm May sunshine from one side of the island to the other, and talked things over. They could:
- Find a 3rd party to manage the software distribution. They had already been contacted by people who said they could do a good job advertising what she had done. Since a large part of the potential market was in Engineering, they could use Simpleplot to produce pictures of naked women. You rather hope that the Scientists were not so vulgar, but you never know …
- Stop offering to distribute the software. They were fully committed. This would give them both a welcome respite.
- Do it themselves, but one of them would have to give up their job.
It was a relatively easy, but momentous decision. Judy would stay fully employed. She was quite obviously the brains behind the project, and it would be senseless wasting her time on business administration. They could live on one wage, being good Methodists, and able to live simply. “Sufficient is enough“. David would leave his University post. The University were compliant in this. They were looking for opportunities to get rid of staff. They offered to find an office for him, give him casual use of a secretary, and pay him £500.00 wages for a year. If the project worked, yippee!! If it didn’t he would have to go away. This was a slave wage, but he had never been covetous – except in his Union (AUT) activities when he had a high sense of moral outrage at exploitation.
Judy’s University software started to become even better known. David wrote articles furiously, and made good friends among Computer Companies. They offered him free computing facilities if he would adapt Judy’s software to their computers and graphics equipment. They gave him advice on marketing. The University Liaison Manager prepared general purpose contracts to be used for new sales. Money for each sale was still split 4 ways, so that the University received 75%, and Judy was given the remainder, but she was too busy designing new modules for her University work to be much bothered about that.
Judy’s attitude to marketing was not conventional. Initial publicity material was monochrome – photocopied leaflets listing the features of the software with some output. David wanted to include reference to the built-in additional glories of using colour to enhance understanding of the data being represented. “No, it is better that when they get it it is even more excellent than they were expecting”. She did not like showing off. Typical.
As the weeks went by it was apparent that this venture stood a good chance of being a success. A new Company was created – Bradford University Software Services Ltd. Judy became a shareholder using the money saved from royalty payments from the University, and a Director. The University was a minority shareholder, and the Government put up £40,000 on the condition that it charged 15% p.a. (these were the Thatcher years) and appointed someone to sit on the Board. He was brilliant, but that is another story.
Wharfedale Children’s Hospital had produced a high-flying Captain of Industry. With all that money, they could rent a Unit in the University Science Park, employ staff, buy a computer (an expensive item then) and set up in business on their own. Everyone helped. Recruiting staff was hap-hazard, but they fell on their feet when one or two exceptional people asked if they could join. In later years other outstanding people were recruited. They still come to Bridlington each Summer to meet up again, and attended Judy’s funeral in force. Their bruises have largely gone down.
It did not go to her head. She still preferred solving mathematical problems, and took her holiday in the Methodist Holiday Home in Blackpool each October with her parents and David and Phil. She and David were probably the only Directors of a Hi-Tech company staying in the Temperance Hotel.
The University gave her 1 year’s leave of absence, and she set about redesigning Simpleplot. Simpleplot was coherent, but had grown up with bits added as they were needed. The programming language she first used was very elementary, and a newer version had been published with useful additional features. Now it was going to be done properly. It was going to be rigorously designed. She was in her element. Within a year Simpleplot Mark 2 was released with full user documentation. She then left the University for good.
Judy’s activities centred around design, documentation and programming. She designed additional modules and soon Simpleplot included separate optional items that customers could buy. Someone else sorted out the finance and David managed the publicity and marketing. No-one much did the administration. There wasn’t time for it. Turnover modestly increased as more people bought licenses, so more people were brought in to fill up the gaps. An opportunity arose to join a Government sponsored Trade mission to Japan. One cold and wet November evening Judy and David set off for Tokyo. This was an experience that both delighted and exhausted her. She stood on a stand in the sales pavilion all day, with a Japanese interpreter in attendance. She thoroughly enjoyed the culture of bowing rather than shaking hands. Shaking hands was always a difficulty with her, as her hands were so distorted with arthritis. Many years before Grandma Whiteley had protected her when they left Chapel so that she could avoid the Preacher’s firm handshake, but in Japan the problem didn’t arise. The interpreter took her out to authentic Japanese restaurants, and she ate authentic Japanese meals with great pleasure.
The trade show lasted a week, and she came back to Bradford on her own, leaving David to conclude a deal with a large computer company based in Tokyo. They neither of them did any sight-seeing. There was just no time available. Judy always hated travelling – it was too uncomfortable – but over the next few years she visited Oregon, Darmstadt, and Nuremburg on business.
The big disadvantage of leaving the University was that she lost daily contact with people with real problems. However, she had made many contacts with people running large computer systems in the Pharmaceutical industry. David would regularly visit them with software updates. A highly respected research manager gave him an academic paper on how to visualise temperature variations in a fish tank (well, it was all about potential levels in a molecule – much the same problem). Solutions to these problems are available on your mobile phone now, but not then. BUSS was offered £5.000 to have a go at implementing something like that in Simpleplot. It would not matter if Judy failed, she could keep the money. She read the paper and thought “I can do loads better than that”. Just about that time a 6th Former about to go to Oxford to read Chemistry was looking for a job for the Summer. For about 2 months he and Judy would meet for about half an hour each day. They would discuss how to frame a solution to each part of the problem in turn. He would go away and implement what they had agreed, and the next day they would look at how near they were moving towards a satisfactory solution.
It worked! Judy documented what they had done, wrote an academic paper co-authored by the student, and they had an additional module they could sell. Very soon their solution was made obsolete by the sort of technology you have on your phone, but for about 3 weeks Judy led the world.
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