Why Did NeXT's Chip Designers Quit After Their Bonuses?

David Senra, reading Geoffrey Cain, says NeXT's chip engineers, Big Dave and Little Dave, took $25,000 bonuses and quit.

For months and years the chip layout never froze. Whenever the designers got close, Jobs changed his mind about how the chip should look, and no one told him the truth. The honest finish was about a year of work, seven days a week. Each time he asked, they said one more month. He kept a list of threats he treated as fatal, and he lit into the two Daves in front of the company. A week or two later they announced the master chip was ready to ship to Japan. He called them geniuses and handed each a bonus worth about half a year's salary. They packed their offices and walked out.

Ninety days later the chip arrived. The team snapped it in and nothing worked. NeXT still had no product and no revenue, so the computer's release moved back a full year.