Adrian Carmack

Adrian Carmack (born May 5, 1969) is an artist and one of the four founders of id Software, together with John Carmack (no relation), John Romero and Tom Hall. He was one of the artists, along with Kevin Cloud and Paul Steed, who designed the art for Quake. He was an employee and director at id Software. Adrian Carmack’s work hours were tracked by executives, access to board documents denied, and in 2004 his company stopped a practice of paying out profits in dividends so that he would receive less than the other directors at id Software. When Activision offered to purchase id Software for $105 million, only Adrian Carmack desired to accept the offer, but the company was not vended because it would force him to vend his shares back at a fraction of what he would have received in a sale to Activision. Adrian Carmack would have to vend his 41% stake in id Software for $11 million, below the $40 million that he could have received from Activision. In 2005, Adrian Carmack was fired by the other owners of his company after he refused to be purchased for $20 million. In a lawsuit he filed against id Software, he sought to have his employment contract declared invalid.