PERSONNEL
PROFILE
Tom Petit
Tom Petit, the exuberant 26
year old Regional Sales Mana-
ger for the Western States, likes
his job. "I'm a game player,"
he says. "I 'm proficient in all
the games because I have to
be for my job. The fact that
they're a lot of fun doesn't hurt
either. " Tom's position as Sales
Manager of the Western States
for the Coin-Operated Division
of ATARI takes him throughout
most of the western states and
Texas.
"I enjoy people, " Tom says,
"and I feel that' s where my
strengths are. Mostly the people
I deal with, the distributors, are
entrepreneurs. It makes my job
more exciting to talk to the man
who runs the business." Tom
especially likes on-location pro-
mot ions which give him a
chance to talk to players and lo-
cation owners. Tom sees the
game indust ry as a business
with giant potential. "As a lead-
ing manufacturer of video
games we must continue to ad-
dress the needs of the players,"
he says. " That 's what keeps
this industry challenging and dy-
. "
nam1c.
Tom started at ATAR I in April
of 1977 while attending the Uni-
versity of Santa Clara. He work-
ed as Schedule Coordinator for
the Vice President of Manufac-
turing. ATAR I at that time was
making pinball games and Tom
worked as a liaison person be-
tween engineering and manu-
facturing for the prototype
games. "I'm lucky I had that
experience because today I
have a strong technical under-
Atari, Inc.
1265 Borregas Avenue
Sunnyvale, California 94086
(I A Warner Communications Company
standing of the product. I' ve
been involved in different areas
like customer service, field ser-
vice, manufacturing and eng i-
neering which has given me a
good understanding of ATARI ,"
Tom says. After graduation
from Santa Clara he became
sales representative and a year
and a half ago was promoted to
Regional Sales Manager.
One of Tom's passions is fol-
lowing the Formula Racing car
circuit. Last year he was able to
attend the North American For-
mu la Atlantic Championship
race held in Long Beach, Cali-
fornia. Among the racers last
year was an upcoming young
Italian named Andrea
DeCesaris, a member of the
McLaren Internationa l team.
"After the race, I went up to
the guy and introduced myself
and said I was from ATARI.
'You play Missile Command?'
DeCesaris asked. 'Yes,' I re-
POSITIVE PUBLICITY
Technical Tip
Varied Media Coverage
for ATARI
As coin-operated games be-
come more and more popular,
and as the public becomes
more aware of coin-op games,
the media covering this industry
becomes more varied. In Octo-
ber, two film crews, one from a
station in Los Angeles and one
from a station in San Jose, Cali-
fornia, filmed feature stories
about ATAR I. CBS-LA filmed a
general segment about ATAR I
for their "Two on the Town"
magazine-format show. KBHK-
TV, a UHF station in the San
Francisco Bay Area, did a hu-
morous ½ -hour show on the
"Silicon Valley environment"
and chose to focus on ATARI as
their more or less archetypal
company in the Valley.
A long article by Aaron
plied, ' I play Missile Command
just as well as you race that
car around the track.' He was
just as impressed with my ex-
pertise on Missile Command as
I was with his racing. We sat in
the McLa ren pit area talking
about Missile Command and
racing. It was great," Tom said.
Tom lives in San Jose and
spends his off hours either
working on his newly purchased
condominium or swimm ing . An
avid swimmer since college, he
likes to get in at least 20,000
yards a week.
Tom's experience at ATARI
and his enthusiastic personality
make him an asset to the sales
department for the Coin-Operat-
ed Division at ATARI.
Latham will appear in the Sun-
day New York Times Magazine
on October 25. Mr. Latham is
the author of ''Urban Cowboy'·
and has written for Esquire and
other national magazines. To
write his piece on ATARI, Mr.
Latham spent about a week at
the Sunnyvale plant, interview-
ing Frank Ballouz, V.P. of Mar-
keting, and Lyle Rains, V.P. of
Engineering. He also went on a
tour of the manufacturing
facility.
All of th is attention is good
for ATARI. But it is also good for
th~ industry. Look for the article
in the Sunday Times . And keep
looking for more positive publici-
ty for the coin-op games in-
dustry.
When replacing ROM
ER2055 with a new ROM , you
must perform the self-test eras-
ing procedure before a game is
played. If the ROM is not eras-
ed, the self-test will indicate the
new ROM to be defective by
displaying the letter E on the
screen. Refer to the self-test
erasing procedure in the
game's service manual.
Promotion
for Profit
If your location uses tokens,
the fol lowing promotion idea
can help increase your profits.
Fill your token machine so that
it dispenses special red tokens
at random intervals. Award the
lucky player who receives a red
token with twenty free games.
First Class
U.S. Postage
PAID
Sunnyvale, CA
Permit 317