Unknown Facts About Hewlett Packard

Hawlett Packard (HP,) founded by William Hewlett and David Packard, is not only one of the largest IT companies in the world, but is a company with quite an interesting history. While the company is famous around the world for their gadgets, there are still a lot things that are clouded in mystery. Here is taking a look at some truly interesting and unique facts about HP!

1. The fateful coin toss

Even though Hewlett Packard is a combination of the names of the two founders, the order of the names came up as a result of a coin toss! With both the partners being undecided on the name, a coin toss was used to declare the order of the name. In the end, Hewlett won the toss, giving him the privilege of having his name in the beginning!

2. The garage that started Silicon Valley 

367 Addison Alley in Palo Alto, United States, widely considered as the birthplace of Silicon Valley, marks the spot where the founders started HP. Once HP was successfully established, the founders bought the garage in the year 2000 and converted it into a museum. The garage is now listed as a Historical Landmark in California!

3. Apple would not have existed without HP 

When Steve Jobs was 12 years old, he wanted to build a high frequency computer but lacked the resources. Instead of asking his parents for help, Jobs looked up Bill Hewlett, the then CEO of HP and wrote him a letter, asking him for help. Bill was so impressed, he gave Jobs a summer job. If Bill had not given Jobs that first internship, Jobs would have never pushed himself to do better every day and Apple probably would not have existed either.

4. Printer within a printer 

Did you know that HP is one of the few companies in the world that prints parts of their printers with a 3D printer?  Almost half of the custom plastic parts for HP Incorporated’s new Multi Jet Fusion 3D printer are printed by the printer itself!

5. The first ever HP product 

Before HP became the HP of today, it used to be something else. HP started off its historical presence in the world by creating audio oscillators. Why were these famous, you ask? Because Walt Disney used them excessively! Walt used audio oscillators as a way of testing and experimenting with theater production sound systems, a system which would later be included in the film Fantasia. HP’s initial involvement with producing these oscillators helped elevate the firm to their success in expanding into the personal computer and printer market we know them for today.

Hewlett Packard came a long way from being just a garage based company to being one of the most successful IT firms in the world. If you think we missed out on any HP related facts, feel free to comment and let us know!