It was on New Year’s day in 1939 when a coin was flipped in a rented garage in Palo Alto to decide which name will come first for their new company. William Hewlett made the right call. Just a few months earlier, they began their business with just over $500 and a few product ideas. It was during the great depression when classmates Hewlett and Packard met in an engineering class at Stanford University. It was near their graduation and they both decided if they couldn’t find jobs in the real world, they would just start their own company.

They did. And before long, Walt Disney Studios placed an order for eight HP 200B audio oscillators for their new movie to be named Fantasia. Things moved quickly and by 1942 they had built their first plant. They remained a small company until World War II. The Army Signal Corps called HP to duty and they went to work.

HP was incorporated in 1947 and revenues topped $1.5 billion. When the Korean conflict began in 1950, HP pursued new opportunities. By 1959, HP entered the international markets. HPs first computer was introduced in 1966. In 1972, the slide rule became obsolete as HP introduced the first scientific handheld calculator.

It was in 1984 that HP helped create a new market for fast, yet inexpensive printing with the debut of their Thinkjet printer. It would be there most successful product to date.

Since you are here to purchase HP server parts, we figured you could use a little lesson in the history of Hewlett Packard. We hope you learned something today.