Pravetz computers
| Public | |
| Industry |
Computer hardware Electronics |
| Founded | 1979 (Pravets) /restored 2013/ |
| Founder | Ivan Marangozov |
| Headquarters | Pravets, Bulgaria , now Sofia, Bulgaria |
|
Area served
|
Bulgaria |
|
Key people
|
Boyko Vuchev Chairman and CEO |
| Products | Desktops, servers, notebooks, netbooks |
| Website | www |
Pravetz (Правец in the original Cyrillic, series 8 and series 16) were Bulgarian computers, manufactured mainly in the town of Pravetz. Some components and software were produced in Stara Zagora, Plovdiv, and other Bulgarian cities.
The first Bulgarian-made personal computer, IMKO-1, was a prototype of the Pravetz computers that were developed by Ivan Vassilev Marangozov, who was rightfully accused of cloning the Apple II. In fact, IMKO-1 was a nearly identical clone of the original Apple 2 with a few minor exceptions - case, keyboard, char table (lower case Latin alphabet was replaced with Cyrillic upper case) and power supply (early models used bulky and heavy linear power supplies). A few early models were produced at the ITKR (pronounced ee-teh-kah-reh, Institute of Technical Cybernetics and Robotics), a section of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences. Industrial production in Pravetz started shortly after.
The line of Bulgarian personal computers at the time of release, was prohibitively expensive for individuals and in addition were only sold to different government institutions - educational sector, military and administrative sector.
Pravetz computers were of major importance in the economy of the Comecon.
In October 2013, a privately held Bulgarian company claimed in their website to have the rights on the trademark and misleadingly announced that "Pravetz Computers are returning to market". In fact, the company has no link to the original "Pravetz" computers known during the Soviet Era.
Except for the Oric-derived 8D (and possibly the IMKO-1), all the Pravetz 8-bit systems are largely compatible with the popular Apple II and its successors, with the exception that they offer Cyrillic fonts and some other improvements compared to Apple.
Pravetz-16 were IBM PC compatible:
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Wikipedia