Initially operating from a single-room apartment, Technōs was founded in 1981 by three staff members of Data East. Their first game was "Minky Monkey", released in 1982. A few months after their foundation, a lawsuit was brought up against the company by Data East under allegations that Technos had stolen data from Data East's arcade game "Pro Tennis" with the intent of producing and selling a bootleg of it. The two companies settled in August 1983 and Technos would go on to create two arcade games published by Data East, "Tag Team Wrestling" and "Karate Champ". Technōs Japan's earlier games were published by other companies, as Technōs at the time did not have the economical resource to distribute their own games.