Formerly just another anonymous computer programmer working in a cubicle farm (alongside fellow programmer Roy Kleinberg) at computer mega-corporation Encom, Alan Bradley wrote a security/watchdog program called Tron, which was designed to shut down all unauthorized access between Encom's computers and outside systems. Tron was later instrumental (alongside a digitized Kevin Flynn and Roy's actuarial program Ram), in shutting down the evil Master Control Program, thus ending it's intended plan to take over computer systems world-wide, and allowing Kevin to access the information needed to indict Sr. Exec. VP Edward Dillinger for, among other things, corporate espionage. After his best friend Kevin Flynn's mysterious disappearance in 1989, Alan became something of a surrogate father to Kevin's son, Sam, and secretly financed Roy's organization, Flynn Lives (with accompanying website of the same name), with the express purpose of ensuring that efforts to find Kevin did not fall by the wayside. (It is also speculated that he paid the bills at Flynn's Arcade.) When Sam suddenly decided to take up the reins of Encom in 2010, Alan convinced Roy not to destroy the information that the Flynn Lives members had accumulated over the years.