The HP Story: Part Two

new in a lot of ways. Yeah, it was all about new measuring devices for other devices. If you're just tuning in. Two guys named Bill and Dave decided to work in a garage create a company because they were both electrical engineer years and their their mentor from college from Stanford University in Palo Alto, California, and said, hey, you know you, you should come up with some kind of measurement tools that will be able to help companies

identify negative feedback. Uh. And they did, and then they started making other kinds of products too, and uh gradually uh. And when I say gradually, very rapidly in a burgeoning electronic field. We're able to demonstrate their leadership both as innovators in technology and innovators in price. We're able to accumulate a pretty big business customer base in very short time. They also did a lot to help employees and change

the way people did business in the United States. And if you're wondering about other famous companies that began as a business run out of a garage in California, look up companies like Apple, Microsoft, and Google. Yes, because, as it turns out, if you want to create a technology company in California, your best bet is to start in someone's garage. You know, I necessarily have to be yours either,

you know. I uh, I have a car poard and I feel like most of my projects are short of open ended, right right, So I don't know, Yeah, it doesn't You don't have the full protection that a garage provides. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I've got a garage, but I only run a lemonade stand, and unfortunately my garage does not face the road, so it has had some hard times starting off. Also, we're in the winter right now, so not a huge demand. Clearly, I should have looked at my goals a little more

closely before I launched this this endeavor. But let's get back to HP. Yeah, we decided we were going to take a break towards the end of the nineteen fifties, right before the end of the nineteen fifties, literally because um, again, as you're just tuning in, HP has grown so much

in its first twenty years. Um that wait, no, yeah, first twenty years right that it has decided that it can grow globally, and it um decides to open its own marketing group in Switzerland and a manufacturing operation in Germany. So now we've got UH locations in Europe and in the United States, and it has become a multinational corporation. Yes.

Also in nineteen HP acquired its second company, the Boonton Radio Corporation, which was originally founded in nineteen thirty four, and this company created electronic test equipment, so right there in HP's wheelhouse. So the company is kind of solidifying it's it's u place in the electronics market and again still really concentrating on one particular set of electronic devices,

stuff that's not for consumers. I think it's interesting because Chris, now when you think of HP today, you often what what sort of products do you think of Well, I think of of consumer products, especially computers, because that's what I see more advertising for, and computers. I tend to think also of printers. HP is very big in the world of printers, so we we tend to think of

these devices as HP. If you say HP today, and we'll get to it in our our third part about how when HP was looking at the possibility of spinning off its personal computer business, everyone freaked out. But really, when you look at the history of the company as a whole, the personal computer business is just a very tiny sliver of what that company is all about. And it's easy to forget that because that's sort of the

face that the public is really familiar with. But yes, this, this Boonton Radio Corporation was more along the lines of what the real core of HP's business was all about. Creating these these devices that help companies measure and quantify

what their systems are doing. This is really important in businesses like radio or telecommunications, where you build up these complex networks, these complex infrastructures, and you have to be able to test different parts of the infrastructure to make sure everything's working properly right um well as as you pointed out to UM, you know, UH, you might think that a company that is started and organized and run by engineers might be more uh methodical and may not

necessarily have that UM business aspect to it, where the person running the company as a real business person. But Bill Hewlett and and Dave Packard always had the sort of an idea of how they wanted to run a company behind it, and they came up with the HP way of doing things, and uh Mr Packard came up with his UH rules interactions, and those included keeping an I on your core businesses and uh growing to to

make sure that you're competitive in the future. And this acquisition sort of I think exemplifies that because it is it is both of those things. And also in nineteen fifty nine, that was the year. If you listen to our previous podcast about HP, I mentioned that HP had created a spinoff company called Well, originally Dinak but then later di mac uh and they did they figured out the name by flipping the HP logo upside down and saying, hey, this HP looks like a d y uh. Well in

nine that's when they folded DIMEC back into the HP. Actually, I guess not back into but brought DIMEC under the fold of the umbrella of HP and UH, and it became a division within the company. Now that was when HP had created this whole division structure, So DIMEC became its own sort of autonomous division within HP, and that and that organization was built. You basically offer UH solutions

to customers using HP products. So it made sense that they weren't so far removed from the mother company that it was going to be a poor fit. Now, do you have anything for nineteen sixty because my next note for sixty one another acquisition? Uh? Yeah, Well they acquire the Sandborn Company, which was a medical equipment manufacturer and this is a different a bit of a different field for them, right and uh and this would be part

of HP for well several decades um. It would eventually spin off, and we'll talk about that when it happens. But this was an attempt on HPS part to really kind of broaden its its horizons and get into some industries that at this point it really hadn't dipped its toe into. And also in nineteen sixty one, it was a big year for HP because on March seventeenth, it listed for the very first time on the New York

Stock Exchange. Yes, so, uh, you know, it had launched its I p O previously, but now it's actually listed on the n y s E. Which is that's a big deal for a company. Yes, yes, um. And as a matter of fact, in sixty two, HP had a a another famous uh organization, take note of them, Fortune the magazine. They were named to the Fortune List at number four sixty. It's hard for me to believe now that HP was ever that low on that list, but you know they didn't start at one point yep, yep.

And this is you know again, it's the company is not even thirty years old yet, and it's uh, that's impressive. Yeah, and it makes the Fortune List and that's pretty pretty impressive. And that year they brought in revenues of around a hundred ten million dollars and they had more than six thousand employees by now, so big jump from that two employee operation run out of a garage in Palo Alto. Yes, indeed.

So in in nineteen sixty three, the eight the company comes up with the fifty one hundred A frequency analyzer, which you know, it's it's one of those pieces of equipment again not meant for the average consumer unless you go into space. Yeah. Yeah, Now, if you want to take a look at these, HP has a lot of pictures of these and and I don't know if you took a look at some of them for some of these products brochures as well to sell those products, which

are very very entertaining. Um, but you can get an idea of looking at of looking at these early instruments that HP was providing. Now, the documentation I read about them was that they were very They weren't glamorous, they weren't pretty boxes, but they did they worked very well. The early ones were actually housed in wooden boxes, wooden cabinets. But eventually HP came up with decided that this this

sort of decorative finish. All it really did was it added bulk and expense to the item, and it wasn't really useful. I mean, but yeah, there was a time early in the history of HPS products where if you bought one of these devices that be have you know, the metal front facing with all the controls and everything, and then the actual frame was would and they used oak by the way, that was the wood the voice, yes, and what they decided not to go with the industry standard,

and they decided to go with Oak. By the way, when you talk about those brochures trying to sell these products, I can't help but think of like the stereotypical nineteen fifties commercial where you hear like the music do do Do Do Do Do Do Do do, and say have you come back from a long day at work only to jump into your deep space exploration vehicle and realize you don't have a frequency analyzer. We have just the item for you. And it sounds like the Raymond Scott

accompany accompanied uh item of the future. Um yeah, these these pieces of equipment, um, since they weren't really aimed at the consumer market, they're the kinds of things that look like they cam came off the set of a nineteen fifties science fiction film when they're trying to recreate the control room of a spaceship. Yeah, these are definitely exactly. These are definitely the machines that go ping. Um yeah. And also they work. They did their actual work very well. Yes,

not not exciting to know. It's if to the average person that it looks like, you know, random piece of electronic equipment a Hey, it's got a meter on it. What does it do? And it measures the sound frequencies there really what does it do? Why? Why does it

do that? It's use but yeah, yeah, that's that's the trick of really learning about HPS early products is that if you really want to know, you know, why these things were important, you'd have to have we'd have to do like two more podcasts just to explain the the the equipment that this stuff was used to measure. Yes, but it helped the companies that use them, uh measurably. Yes. Well. In nineteen sixty three, they also entered their first joint

venture from the Yokagawa Hewlett Packard venture in Tokyo. Yeah. So uh, this again shows that the company is looking to expand and this uh Yoka Gawa Hewlett Packard adventure would actually meet with great success become very uh a very powerful company in its own right. So uh nine six four, we have some some titles coming down. Packard becomes the CEO of Hewlett Packard and Hewlett becomes the president of Hewlett Packard. He's also the Packard was also

the chairman. Yes, he would later become the chairman as well, and in fact, that's different jafferent chairman, different chairman of the board. UM. In fact, eventually, not yet, but eventually it would become pretty standard at HP for a single person to hold the titles of CEO, President and chairman. Now at this point that's divided up. Packard is CEO and chairman and Hewlett as the president. UM. In ninety four was also when the fifties sixty A launched the

atomic claws and you standard for international time. Yeah, tomic clock is very very accurate. You know, nothing, nothing says what time? Is it? Like atomic decay? Yep, yep. And again, if you look at one of these things, it doesn't look like your average desk or your clock radio that

sits on your bedside table. It's it's a big machine with lots of things on it, right, it's not When Mickey's big hand is on the mushroom cloud and his little hand is on the Manhattan Project, that means it's time to get out of the house, crawl into something that's lead. Yeah, there's a completely different clock from the the bulletin the atomic scientists that that measures that I read a different brochure than you did. Anyway. Okay, so

should we get into the nineteen six period. That's when HP laboratories laboratories laboratories, that was that was the first time at which they actually said, hey, let's set aside a group of people dedicated to come up with new and cool stuff. Yeah, this is their research and development arm where they're really looking into breaking ground in new technologies, which you know, again, HP wasn't so concerned with previously in its history. It's not that they weren't innovative. They were.

They really looked at improving existing technologies, making the more affordable, making them more efficient. UM and both Hewlett and Packard were were known for designing their own, you know, devices that would later become products within the HP line. But this is a group specifically dedicated to, hey, guys, UH make new stuff. And they picked a guy named Barney Oliver to lead the group. He was the founding director

of HP Labs. UH. And in nineteen sixty six was also when a new first for HP launched a Yes, first computer. H have you seen this thing? Yes, when Mickey's big hand is on the mushroom cloud. No, I did, I did see this. It was it was it was pretty big. Although we should say not as big as some of the other computers that were they were just hitting the market or in the in the mid sixties. I love the language that HP used on its timeline for this, the first go anywhere, do anything comput Yes,

if you had a forklift right. But still it was not the size of room. It wasn't as big as an entire room like some computers were. This is not what you would consider a netbook counter now, but it was the first time the HP used integrated circuits in its electronics, and uh, the computer was meant to work in and a quote unquote average environment, meaning that you wouldn't necessarily have to have a heavily air conditioned room with spring loaded floors so that so that it could

support this machine and make sure that doesn't overheat. You know. The idea was that HPCE was trying to aim for a market for businesses that needed computing power but didn't necessarily have the um the money to spend not just on the computer, but also on completely renovating a part of their building so that could support a computer. Because think about that. Let's say that you own a business already and it's a successful business, and you need a

computer for some reason like database management. And you realize that if you were to buy the computer, not only would it cost an astronomical amount, but you would have to completely change at least part of your building so that it could hold a computer. This was kind of HP's solution to that problem. And uh, it originally had four K of magnetic core memory, expandable up to thirty

two K. Yeah. Yeah. Now, now it's important to to note that they developed this this device very quickly for a device like it, and um, it was fairly rare for a computer to ship with its own software at this point, but but this one did. Um. As a matter of fact, it took several data systems engineers and DIMAC employees working together to get this thing going. But it did power the woods whole ocean at graphic institutes work for many years. Yeah. And it was actually used

on a boat. It was so so it was exposed to see air and was still able to work for more than a decade. You mean, the chain that was the research vessel that used this this computer. And so the original cost for one of these things, depending on if you wanted it totally tricked out or not, the base cost trick you mean with the flame paint job and the side and and yeah, and it and the glowing undercarriage tricked out, meaning that it had memory. Uh

you hear it going down. The base price was base The base price was twenty five grand, and the upper level of it was a fifty grand, which in today's dollars, because he knew I had to do that, right, one forty six thousand for the cheap cheap or two d three thousand, ninety three dollars for the expensive one. So more than a quarter of a million dollars if you wanted to have that thirty two k of memory. Boy, I'm glad the memory prices have gone down recently. Well, um,

it's interesting. Uh, we should probably step it up because we're hoping to make it to the eighties here. Um, but that that isn't important. That is an important product. Also. The next one that I had was the one that came out with the Night which, depending on how you looked at it, was the first personal computer. Ye, if you looked at the advertising computer. So this is the first time, the first documented case of the term personal computer, and it's for the the HP A. And this was

not a personal computer. The way you and I are familiar. Um, it's not not like a desktop computer you sit down, or even a laptop or anything. No, it was a scientific calculator. Um. It was meant as a personal computer in the sense that it could compute operations like you would put in a scientific operation and it could give you the answer. It wasn't meant as a computer that would run programs the way that the modern computers do well.

Wired magazine said it was the first personal computer. And I would argue that if you take it in the literal sense, they're probably right. Um it's it's a fairly big machine. Again, there are photos of it on the the HP website. Um, but it was a pretty significant machine. I mean compared to other devices that would would do this level of work. Um. You know, it was a smaller device and it could be used, uh, you know, pretty easily. Um. It is bulky by today's terms, by

by every stretch of the imagination. Um, but it could do a lot um and uh, and it was you know able, you could you could put this on your desk. So you know, I think it's I think it's when you take it down to the term computer, I think that's an accurate description. But yeah, it doesn't do all the stuff that you're not you're not going to play farm villains. You're not going to figure it as a PC. No. But but that is interesting that it was the first

documented case of personal computer. And now, of course that doesn't necessarily mean that what that term wasn't used before this. It's just this is the earliest documented instance. So in nineteen sixty nine, UM, the United States calls upon Packard. Again, Hewlett had uh been uh in shure. You know, Hewlett had served time in the United States Army as an officer from UH forty one through forty seven. But in nineteen sixty nine, the United States government called upon Packard

and appointed him to be the US Deputy of Defense. Yeah, so Hewlett became the CEO, the president and CEO in Packard's absence. UM. Yeah, that that's pretty significant because again, one of the commitments that he wanted to make for the company was service, um, serving your community and serving your country. And yeah, nineteen sixty nine through nineteen seventy two, that's an extensive time period for any any you know, industry leader to step away and refocus on a government position.

And this is also a time when the company is sort of gradually expanding its work to include more than just measurement and medical devices, but they're also getting in on the ground floor of what would become personal computing. So nineteen seventy one HP introduces laser interferometers, which take measurements using lasers, so that they started to get into that. Uh. Nineteen seventy two they introduced the HP three thousand, which

was a computer meant for businesses. It wasn't a personal computer, but it was meant to help businesses manage databases. And they also introduced the HP thirty five. Uh. Now, the HP thirty five actually are a couple models, UM, well, sort of. The HP thirty five Classic is a handheld calculator. UM. They did, however, UH offer Mr Hewlett at abacus version of it. They took a shell and put an avocus where the buttons would be and presented it to him.

There's a photo of it. It's classic. It's an awesome jo Apparently he thought it was hilarious. I didn't see this one, but that does sound like something he would appreciate. Would hold generally, I try not to hold stuff up where Jonathan can see it during the podcast because he you know, sort of goes home, especially since I don't have my glasses on. Okay, well then i'll show it

to you later. But yeah, this was This was a When I think of calculators in the nineteen seventies, I think of t I Texas Instruments, a company we have already talked about. But HP was definitely right in there with them mixing it up. UM and the HP thirty five was one of the workhorses of the seventies handheld calculators, and HP claims it's the first handheld scientific calculator, so not necessarily the first handheld calculator, but first handheld scientific calculator.

So they were doing science. Yes, this is a triumph making a note here success, we'll look at us here talking when there's science to be done. H this is not the one that can print in Japanese, because there is the nineteen seventy three they did introduce a scientific

calculator that could print in Japanese. That was actually, you know, that sounds like it might be pretty trivial, but really, when you think about how complex the um that it is to to be able to print in a another language like that, especially one that has a completely different concept as far as alphabets are concerned. Um, well, there's a big deal. AT had a numbered data registers and the ability to store and recall um math and could could do built in conversion. It's better at math than

I am than I can store and recall. Also had a hidden timer inside, so if you weren't doing your work fast stuff. I'm kidding. UM. And the and the HP eight was the first pocket sized business calculator UM, which was following on the the HP thirty five success. And then it had an HP There was an HP eighty one which had a desktop printing capability to so in nineteen seventy four, HP produced the first mini computer to rely on dynamic random access memory chips or DAM.

We've talked about that recently on the show. And they also created the first programmable pocket calculator. I'm the operator of my pocket calculator. Nineteen they introduced an interface bus, which was you know, this is what allopts computers work with other devices. Um, so's the place where you plug in other stuff, right, So I mean again, it sounds like, well,

you know what's the big deal there? Well, if you don't have one of these, then your devices are all working independently of each other, and in order for you to to plug in information from one to another, you have to do it manually. This would allow devices to actually communicate with one another. Um. Pretty limited basis at this point in the history of computing, but still a big development. Yep. And you can tell again we're getting into the era where things are supposed to talk to

other things. So, um, if you had a calculator, you might need it to print, um, And you might want a pocket calculator that might need to be attached to a printer, or a computer that might need to be attached to a printer. So that's something like that is very important. And then so my next note is in nineteen in nineteen seventy said, well, I had the HP seven, which is yet another calculator. Again, they're they're making business machines.

But if you think about it, UM, a measuring device might be used by the engineers and the department of a different company. So this is my my take on this. You start thinking about scientific calculators, handheld calculators, pocket calculators, these are the kinds of things that might be used by the engineers and the business people the count inside or yeah, this is we're marketing transition where the devices

are getting less specialized. Um and and really you can look at this also as a slow move towards the consumer market. It would still be a while before we actually hit true consumer products through HP. But it's um it's a good indicator. So in Hewlett retires as president, but he remains the CEO, and a fellow by the name of John Young becomes the president of HP, and Packard remains the chairman of the board. Yes, um, did

you want to talk about the HP zero one? Well, I don't have any notes on it, so I could, but if I do, I'm going to be making it all up. The HP zero one calculator watch. It looked like a digital watch but had a calculator and there it had more than three dozen functions according to HP. So we're beginning to learn a lot more about Mr Palette in this podcast, as his excitement over calculators becomes something troubling to me. Uh, well, sometimes you need that

extra digit. Um. I love the way that says the copy on the HP website said it allowed you to manipulate an inter re late time so apparently you could go forward and backward in time, so then you could go back to that stock and head forward to UM. It was code named Cricket, and it was a business failure. It was huge UM and they only sold it through like Huge as in the It was a large watch. You couldn't lift your arm, put your arms down when

you get to school. No, I'm kidding, I'm kidding, I'm teasing, but it was. It was bulky. If you look again, they have photos on the HP site. It was not a small device by UM, but it did have a alis built into the bracelet part of the watch, so you could use it for that. UM. It was also to the point where they only sold it in high

end jewelry store so you know UM. However, because they the miniaturization was kind of UM proprietary, you might say, uh, as soon as they discontinued its manufacturer, they destroyed it so that they couldn't that no one else could get hold of the it wouldn't fall into the wrong hands. Well, if you've got a time machine, you gotta be destroy it because otherwise who knows could who could get hold

of it? Yes, yes, but at the time it was released you could buy one for six fifty dollars for the silver version or seven fifty for the gold version. Not cheap. That's not cheap in to day's dollars. So anyhow, So, getting close to the end of the seventies, Yeah, Hewlett retires completely from the company and John John Young becomes presidency. Well Hewlett, they had trouble retired, true retiring Yeah, well, these it was their baby. I don't blame they made

this this company. But he's no longer the the head of the company. John Young is both president and CEO at that time. And then in nineteen seventy nine, HP creates the HP Company Foundation. Uh. And at this point the revenues for the company are at two point four billion with a B dollars and and HP employees more than fifty thousand people. Yes, and this is when they decide that HP will be far more successful if disco music weren't popular, So they began a campaign to end

the popular hitting. It's forty years after the founding of the company and now they are success. I mean, no, no portal joke intended there exactly really absolutely established itself as a massive success. And uh, this marks a time where you know, in nineteen eighty we're going to see some some interesting UM developments, including HPS move into the industries that were familiar with today, the consumer industries were

familiar with today. But I think that that will serve as our third and final part of the HP story as it stands today. Clearly the company is still going as we speak, so it's not that their history is over, but we are going to cover from night up to present day as of the recording of this podcast. Anyway, in our next segment, Yes, it gets considerably messier in the next segment. Yeah, this is where we start to

wins UM and we'll get into why that is. And it's it's a complex story and not an entirely happy one, but still very important company, so we will we will cover that in our next episode. If you guys have any suggestions for topics you would like us to cover, whether it's another focus on a company or an innovator, or if it's a specific product or just a concept in technology in general, let us know. You can drop us a line on Facebook or Twitter or handled there

is tech stuff. H s W and Chris and I will talk to you again really soon. Be sure to check out our new video podcast, Stuff from the Future. Join how Stuff Work staff as we explore the most promising and perplexing possibilities of tomorrow. The house Stuff Works iPhone app has arrived. Download it today on iTunes. Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you