asynchronous, bisynchronous, SDLC, and HDLC protocols. Sales of this initial lineup of products doubled every month within the first year of availability. Needing to keep up with the increasing demand from the customer base, the company vied for venture capital but were turned down by multiple banks. Instead, the founders all took out second mortgages on their residences in 1982 and were able to pool an additional $50,000 to invest into the company. Fortunately for the founders, AST's sales reached $13 million in 1983. This sudden increase in sales finally attracted venture capitalists, who invested $2.4 million in the company. In 1984, the company filed its initial public offering, bearing two million shares to the public in June that year. In late 1983, the company introduced the SixPakPlus, a popular multifunction expansion card for the IBM PC that led to another sharp increase in sales. Shortly afterwards AST signed an agreement offered by IBM, allowing the latter company to resell AST's expansion cards at its IBM Product Centers and other reseller channels. Spurred by these developments, in March 1985 AST's executives opened AST Far East, Ltd., in Hong Kong. This was its first international subsidiary, serving as a crucial additional production line for the manufacture of the company's increasingly diverse products. AST's lineup of products by this point counted graphics cards for multiple computing platforms, a hard disk drive unit for the original compact Macintoshes, a multi-function serial/parallel/clock expansion board for the Apple II and a local area network board for the IBM PC. From 1984 to 1985, AST's income rose from $5.7 million to $19 million, and from 1985 to 1986, AST's revenues doubled, reaching $138.6 million, In March 1986, the company purchased the French computer wholesaler National System Company, in order to establish a second international subsidiary, AST France. Shortly after, AST company acquired Camintonn, a computer memory maker. By the end of 1986, AST had established overseas divisions in the Australia, Germany, the United Kingdom, and Canada. The combined revenue from international subsidiaries contributed to one quarter of the company's revenue. With this success, AST reincorporated in Delaware to take advantage of its corporate laws. PC compatibles and Apple expansion (1986–1989) By late 1986, AST's expansion card offerings were facing imminent obsolescence, as IBM by this point had offered higher-end upgraded models of the IBM PC, chiefly the PC XT and the PC/AT, that integrated most of