> Stephen Wolfram would die before he gave up control, the entire thing is his precious child.

I understand that Wolfram made unrealistic agreements with the original programmers, incompatible with growing a large organization to support his evolving vision for Mathematica. Rather than renegotiating, he attempted a maneuver that did not survive a court challenge. The original programmers are now rich.

I cannot find any account of this on the web. There's an unrelated "Fields medalist car accident" that I again know from first-hand accounts, that also has no trace on the web. Huh.