 They decided to ask for help to get a version of BASIC ready in time for the show.In September 1978, Shepardson Microsystems won the bid on completing BASIC and was finishing Cromemco 16K Structured BASIC for the Z80-based Cromemco S-100 bus machines.What became Atari BASIC is essentially a pared-down version of Cromemco BASIC ported to the 6502.