Tech history was made on April 1, 1976 when Steve Wozniak and the late Steve Jobs signed a three page document that officially launched Apple. Today CNN reports that those papers sold at auction for a whopping $1.35 million at the Sotheby's auction house in New York.
There were actually two sets of papers that were put up for auction today. The first was the three page document signed by Jobs, Wozniak and a man named Ron Wayne. While Jobs and Wozniak owned 45 percent each of the company, Way got 10 percent when he also signed the papers. However, just 11 days later, Wayne decided to pull out of the new company. His two page document, where he sold off his share of Apple to Jobs and Woznick for just $800, was also included in the auction.
As the article points out, Wayne could have held onto his measly 10 percent share of Apple which today would be worth in the billions of dollars. Ouch.
As far as the auction itself, the starting bid for the Apple founding papers was just $70,000 but quickly went beyond the $1 million bid mark in a matter of minutes. The final bid was made by telephone by an unidentified, but obviously very rich, bidder. You can see the final part of the auction in the video above.
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