Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology? With
Speaker 1: tech Stuff from how stuff dot com. Hello everyone, and
Speaker 1: welcome to tech stuff. My name is Chris Poulette and
Speaker 1: I am an editor at how stuff works dot com.
Speaker 1: Sitting across from me as a guy who likes to
Speaker 1: embed Easter eggs and all his articles, Senior writer Jonathan Strickland,
Speaker 1: A screaming comes across the sky. Wow, thank you. That's significant. Yes, uh,
Speaker 1: not for what we're talking about, really, but I like
Speaker 1: the quote. Yes. Today we are doing part one of
Speaker 1: a multi part series on a company that has had
Speaker 1: a massive influence on the world of technology, Hewlett Packard,
Speaker 1: and massive influence on American business as well. I mean, really,
Speaker 1: there without HP, there's not really a silicon valley. No.
Speaker 1: HP was kind of the the kernel that would grow
Speaker 1: into the glorious crop that is silicon value. And my
Speaker 1: metaphors are terrible today, thanks, but anyway, yeah, HP is
Speaker 1: kind of it's one of those companies that really is
Speaker 1: the foundation for what we think of a silicon valley,
Speaker 1: even though you might not necessarily think of HP as
Speaker 1: an innovator, like the people who created the integrated circuit
Speaker 1: or you know, it's not like it's Bell Labs or
Speaker 1: Texas Instruments even, but they were very good. It's a
Speaker 1: company that's very good at creating technologies that were priced lower,
Speaker 1: more efficient than other companies, and so really kind of
Speaker 1: propelled the electronics industry into the mainstream. Yeah. And in
Speaker 1: a lot of ways, their innovations came from UM products
Speaker 1: that used those devices, transistors and a lot of the
Speaker 1: other uh devices that we've talked about for other companies
Speaker 1: that have have been innovators and technology. UM. But it's
Speaker 1: funny because this is a this is a company where
Speaker 1: two guys met on a camping trip and ended up
Speaker 1: building a company based on negative feedback. Yeah, that's funny.
Speaker 1: Funny you should say it that way. Yeah, So, um,
Speaker 1: let's let's say that. Well, let's set the scene a
Speaker 1: little bit. So, So in nineteen twenty nine, there was
Speaker 1: a little event where some stocks took a little dip
Speaker 1: and plunge the world into poverty and economic chaos. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was. It was a depression that was so incredible.
Speaker 1: It was great, the Great Depression. I the people who
Speaker 1: lived through it wasn't so great for them. But yeah,
Speaker 1: the Great Depression hits nineteen nine, and really the world
Speaker 1: is in recovery all through the nineteen thirties. You know,
Speaker 1: it's it's not something that the world just bounces back from.
Speaker 1: But in the mid thirties, two Stanford University students met,
Speaker 1: as you said, on a camping trip, but which I
Speaker 1: think it's fascinating. Yeah, but these guys were both attending
Speaker 1: Stanford University and the pursuing degrees in electrical engineering, and
Speaker 1: it was William Bill, Reddington Hewlett and Dave Packard. Yeah,
Speaker 1: keeping in mind too, we're we're talking about the late
Speaker 1: nineteen twenties and early nineteen thirties. UM. Regular listeners of
Speaker 1: tech stuff will remember our conversations about a C versus
Speaker 1: d C back UM in in you know, within that
Speaker 1: we're talking within fifty years of places getting wired. So
Speaker 1: these guys are really kind of still on the cutting
Speaker 1: edge of electricity. This is the point where people are
Speaker 1: studying electrical engineering. So they're you know, they're they're getting
Speaker 1: in on the beginnings of UM a brand new type
Speaker 1: of industry for the for the United States and in
Speaker 1: the world. And so they both graduate in nine with
Speaker 1: undergraduate degrees, but Hewlett was suing his work. He was
Speaker 1: actually pursuing a master's degree in electrical engineering, and as
Speaker 1: part of his thesis, he began to work on a
Speaker 1: prototype of a device called an audio oscillator. And here's
Speaker 1: where negative feedback comes in. Yeah, because one of one
Speaker 1: of his mentors was very interested in this work and
Speaker 1: was kind of taking a shine. Actually he kind of
Speaker 1: took a shine to both of these lads back in
Speaker 1: the day. But yeah, So the oscillator, in case you're
Speaker 1: wondering what it's supposed to do, it actually creates a
Speaker 1: steady specific tone and you can choose various tones depending
Speaker 1: upon the oscillator. It's not like if it's not like
Speaker 1: if it's not a machine that only goes deep. No,
Speaker 1: but it allows you to create a steady specific tone.
Speaker 1: And it's really used as a measurement devices to help
Speaker 1: try and test other devices. And for a long time
Speaker 1: that's what he Hewlett Packard the company was known for producing.
Speaker 1: It wasn't known for produce saying devices that the average
Speaker 1: person would find useful. It was producing devices that industries
Speaker 1: were using to test their own equipment so that their
Speaker 1: equipment was you know, properly running. Yeah, HP, I would
Speaker 1: I would argue that HP was a business to business company,
Speaker 1: not completely, but for the most part up until the
Speaker 1: late twentieth century. Yeah. Yeah, So this oscillator, Uh, this
Speaker 1: prototype that that Hewlett creates ends up being a pretty
Speaker 1: useful design, and it forms the basis of what would
Speaker 1: become HP's first product. Now it didn't HP did not
Speaker 1: exist as a company yet, but when Hewlett had created
Speaker 1: this prototype, which later would become the Model two hundred A.
Speaker 1: And by the way, the reason why it was called
Speaker 1: the Model two A was to sort of give companies
Speaker 1: the idea that Hewlett Packard had been around as its
Speaker 1: own entity for a while, sort of like when you
Speaker 1: start a new checking account and they ask you if
Speaker 1: you want your checks to be numbered at a different
Speaker 1: number so it looks like your accounts older than it
Speaker 1: actually is. Or when you form a band and your
Speaker 1: first album is called Greatest Hits. Yes, yes, that would
Speaker 1: be the idea. Uh, don't you know, I know that
Speaker 1: there are bands who have done that. I was gonna say,
Speaker 1: don't steal that, but technically I guess I stole it.
Speaker 1: So anyway, so Hewlett creates this prototype and during this
Speaker 1: process before there's actually a company, Um, a Disney engineer
Speaker 1: saw the prototype the two what what would become the
Speaker 1: two hundred day and the Disney engineer was working on
Speaker 1: a little movie called Fantasia. Yes, we've talked about that too,
Speaker 1: about the cents around system. Yeah, it was definitely a
Speaker 1: big player in changing the way movie theaters are designed. Really,
Speaker 1: I mean, to to truly show Fantasia in the way
Speaker 1: that it was meant to be shown, theaters were going
Speaker 1: to have to spend thousands of dollars renovating and changing
Speaker 1: out their systems. In fact, very few theaters in the
Speaker 1: grand scheme of things actually followed through on this, but
Speaker 1: it did help push through the whole surround sound era. Anyway,
Speaker 1: the engineer saw potential uses for this oscillator, but not
Speaker 1: exactly in the form factor that it was in uh
Speaker 1: in eight, So he made some suggestions to to Hewlett
Speaker 1: about how to change that, and so Hewlett then went
Speaker 1: to work on that and would sell in nineteen nine
Speaker 1: eight model two hundred B oscillators for the princely sum
Speaker 1: of seventy one dollar and fifty cents each. There was
Speaker 1: a lot of money back down. Yeah, that that totaled
Speaker 1: out to be five and seventy two dollars. Well, that's
Speaker 1: important because in nineteen nine, did you have something else? Well,
Speaker 1: I I have a couple of bits that actually go
Speaker 1: back before that. Oh well, then we're gonna have to backtrack.
Speaker 1: Well just just just a tad um to nine ten
Speaker 1: o five actually, because this is sort of relevant, but
Speaker 1: it's not. I think this is one of the fascinating
Speaker 1: things about HP because the thing I'm going to talk
Speaker 1: about is sort of legendary and HP lore. It's a
Speaker 1: house built at three sixties seven Addison Avenue in Palo Alto, California.
Speaker 1: Um The residents there are Dr John Spencer and his
Speaker 1: wife and two adult daughters. As a matter of fact,
Speaker 1: he was the first mayor of Palo Alto. But um
Speaker 1: actually divided the house in eighteen into two apartments. And uh,
Speaker 1: if you look at the Sandborn Insurance maps in nineteen
Speaker 1: twenty four, there's a twelve by eighteen foot garage that
Speaker 1: appears on the property. The garage is what I would
Speaker 1: call a shock Ye look at a picture of it.
Speaker 1: It looks like a little bitty shack. Yes, yes, so
Speaker 1: in ms love shack in thirty five, Dave Packard moved
Speaker 1: to Schenectady, New York to work at ge UM see
Speaker 1: again one of the early electrical aniers UM. And Bill
Speaker 1: finished his graduate work at at Stanford UM and then
Speaker 1: went to m I T returned to Palo Alto, and
Speaker 1: then that's where they you know that, that's where they
Speaker 1: ended up living, was in that house because they had
Speaker 1: their first business meeting uh in seven he uh Dave
Speaker 1: was still working at ge at the time, and uh
Speaker 1: Bill convinced him, hey, let's make a go for this.
Speaker 1: And Fred Turman, who was the professor at Stanford, who
Speaker 1: had sort of taken a shine to them, was the
Speaker 1: one who made a suggestion that maybe just maybe they
Speaker 1: should uh use this create this device, the oscillatory you
Speaker 1: were talking about to detect negative feedback. UM. So yeah,
Speaker 1: in thirty nine, that's when on January one, as a
Speaker 1: matter of fact, that's when they formalized their partnership. They
Speaker 1: decided they were going to go and make a company.
Speaker 1: And I love the way they decided to choose a name,
Speaker 1: Heads or Tails. Now we're not kidding, that's really how
Speaker 1: they decided who's aime was going to be first. It
Speaker 1: was a coin Flip and Packard one, and yet he
Speaker 1: chose Hewlett Packard as the name. Well I'm glad he
Speaker 1: did because HP we know of as HP. But if
Speaker 1: it had ended up being pH wonder which one of
Speaker 1: them was more acidic, or that's a very base company,
Speaker 1: or maybe people would talk about their stock and say, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's neutral. Yeah, there's a lot of jokes that we
Speaker 1: could make. Yeah, HP is an iconic now, yes, and
Speaker 1: then I think they accidentally chose wisely. So they formed
Speaker 1: this company January one, nine and they the company is
Speaker 1: is essentially operating out of that little garage. Well that's
Speaker 1: actually where Bill had been living, except in nine he
Speaker 1: married Flora, his wife, and then moved out. Yeah, which
Speaker 1: which was good because they needed a business office. Now
Speaker 1: do you know how much money they spent to form
Speaker 1: this company? Well, I know, I know how much money
Speaker 1: they had. Well I know the asset, Yes, the assets
Speaker 1: to the company that was in cash, five hundred thirty
Speaker 1: eight dollars in cash and a used drill press, used
Speaker 1: Craftsman drill press, by the way, interesting that somebody had
Speaker 1: documented if you're wondering what that is in today's dollars,
Speaker 1: eight thousand three hundred fifty four dollars, not exactly princely
Speaker 1: Some to found what would become a multinational, multibillion dollar company.
Speaker 1: You know, for those of you keeping score on the
Speaker 1: Tech Stuff scorecard. That is the second time he's used
Speaker 1: the term Princely Some in this podcast. Yeah. Well, the
Speaker 1: five hundred and seventy two dollars that they had made
Speaker 1: from Disney was more than what their starting capital was.
Speaker 1: So they're doing pretty well. Yeah, they're they were profitable
Speaker 1: early on anyway. Um so, yeah, so nine thirty nine
Speaker 1: they formed this company. They've flipped the kay and they
Speaker 1: figured out what they're calling themselves, and they officially start
Speaker 1: to market the Model two hundred a oscillator, which was
Speaker 1: based on that prototype that Hewlett had built in his
Speaker 1: master's thesis. They had. They did pretty well pretty quickly
Speaker 1: because they were able to move out of the garage. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: by the by the time nine ends, their revenue is
Speaker 1: five thousand, three d sixty nine dollars and they have
Speaker 1: two employees. Hey, but then in nineteen forty they move
Speaker 1: into a least building. They don't own the building, they're
Speaker 1: still leasing space, but they're able to expand outside of
Speaker 1: the garage, and in nineteen forty they do something spectacular.
Speaker 1: Are you talking about the the this is the business
Speaker 1: leadership party bonuses Christmas bonus to their employees, which that
Speaker 1: that was the princely sum drink of five dollars. But
Speaker 1: again five dollars wasn't that wasn't small at that point.
Speaker 1: And they also adopted production bonuses too. They didn't have
Speaker 1: too many employees. It wasn't it wasn't a huge investment,
Speaker 1: but it was. It does show an early example of
Speaker 1: what the founders thought was important when they were forming
Speaker 1: a company. They really this was an era. It's it's
Speaker 1: easy to forget today, right, but this was an era
Speaker 1: where the idea of company loyalty was a big deal,
Speaker 1: especially because you're talking about after the Great Depression, where
Speaker 1: things were so uncertain for so long. It was very
Speaker 1: important for companies to establish themselves as being reliable, as
Speaker 1: being stable, and as being it was a two way street.
Speaker 1: You know, employees would contribute their work and their efforts
Speaker 1: for the success of the company, and the company in
Speaker 1: turn would look after the employees and so not to
Speaker 1: make to say that everything every company did back then
Speaker 1: was good, but it was a different world. Than it
Speaker 1: is today. Today, you might see someone with an engineering
Speaker 1: degree hop around quite a bit from company to company
Speaker 1: as they find the best the best deal for themselves personally. Well,
Speaker 1: this was a different era where you know, you you
Speaker 1: you got hired by a company and you tended to
Speaker 1: stay there. Yeah, well you were kind of expected to
Speaker 1: stay there, you know. Well, Plus, you know, thinking again
Speaker 1: about the times economic times, this was fresh after the
Speaker 1: Great Depression. The company was still uh it was hot
Speaker 1: on the heels of the recovery period or in the
Speaker 1: recovery period really, so you were kind of lucky to
Speaker 1: have a job. So they didn't have to do this,
Speaker 1: but they did anyway. And they also offered the company's
Speaker 1: first charitable donation, which was again the princely sum of
Speaker 1: five dollars four times uh so. Yeah, And and the
Speaker 1: way that they were able to be so successful so
Speaker 1: early on lay in Hewlett's design of these oscillators. Now,
Speaker 1: the oscillators that were on the market already before HP
Speaker 1: had formed were often sold for between two hundred and
Speaker 1: six hundred dollars uh, and Hewlett was able to create
Speaker 1: more efficient ways of of building these devices using cheaper
Speaker 1: materials and uh and even make them more reliable. So
Speaker 1: they weren't just less expensive to create, but they were
Speaker 1: better oscillators than a lot of the ones that were
Speaker 1: on the market already. His two a oscillator was sold
Speaker 1: for fifty four dollars and forty cents, which was a
Speaker 1: price apparently chosen because they liked the slogan fifty four
Speaker 1: forty or fight that's true, which is you know, this
Speaker 1: tells you something about the founders of HP, where they
Speaker 1: settle on the price for their for their products based
Speaker 1: upon popular slogans from the nineteenth century. That's okay with me.
Speaker 1: I always like the quirky companies. Yeah, you know, I
Speaker 1: gotta say that this whole oscillator thing I keep going
Speaker 1: back and forth on. So let's analyze some waves, shall we.
Speaker 1: Well there was an interesting wave um. Of course. One
Speaker 1: was the year that the United States entered World War
Speaker 1: Two after the bombing of Pearl Harbor um and as
Speaker 1: a matter of fact, Bill decided to leave the company
Speaker 1: for a while. He served as an army officer until
Speaker 1: nineteen seven. So Dave took over and said, all right, well,
Speaker 1: I'll leave the company until you come back, right, And
Speaker 1: he did, and that in ninety one was also when
Speaker 1: HP began the production of the three hundred A, which
Speaker 1: was a wave analyzer sound it's was made for UM
Speaker 1: measuring amplifiers. And then there was also a a volt
Speaker 1: meter that Packard designed in nineteen forty one. In ninety
Speaker 1: two that would start that would be sold as the
Speaker 1: four hundred A. So again these one thing I would
Speaker 1: I would uh scream out to to the the time
Speaker 1: Vortex would be for Hewlett and Packard to name their
Speaker 1: products something other than numbers and then a letter because
Speaker 1: it's very confusing to me. But yes, the three d
Speaker 1: A is a wave analyzer, the four hunt A is
Speaker 1: a voultmeter. And then in n HP does another jump
Speaker 1: in in the way of a company looking after its employees. Yes,
Speaker 1: it introduces health insurance for employees. It's not the only
Speaker 1: company to do this, but it's one of the earliest ones. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1: As a matter of fact, they started building the first
Speaker 1: HP owned building. So we're looking now at just a
Speaker 1: couple of years after the company got on its feet. Um,
Speaker 1: it's able to construct its own building, and they decided
Speaker 1: they wanted the floor pant plan to be wide open. Um.
Speaker 1: You know, it was supposed to be versatile. That's that's
Speaker 1: kind of a practicality part of it. But as it
Speaker 1: turns out, it was also and also made it easier
Speaker 1: for the company employees to share ideas and come up
Speaker 1: with with new new kinds of concepts and new new products. Yea,
Speaker 1: so this is a moving away from the old. Everyone
Speaker 1: has their own office model and at this point everyone
Speaker 1: is eight employees. Well, you know, it's still kind of tiny.
Speaker 1: It is kind of tiny. Okay. So in three h
Speaker 1: HP got into microwaves, and we're not talking about cooking,
Speaker 1: we're talking about again making products for other businesses that
Speaker 1: use microwaves. So they were getting into signal generators. So,
Speaker 1: which is not something that you are I typically use
Speaker 1: as part of our day to day stuff, but not
Speaker 1: typically No once you know, once in a blue moon,
Speaker 1: Well only when you need to generate signals. I'm pretty
Speaker 1: good at generating signals. Yeah, we can't stop the signal.
Speaker 1: So anyway, so in the the owner of the house,
Speaker 1: um was who which with bead dead. Let's turn this over.
Speaker 1: The owner of the house with the garage left Palo
Speaker 1: Alto um and when when she did, uh, the subsequent
Speaker 1: owners of the house continue to lease it out as
Speaker 1: apartments and even the garage to um. But we'll come
Speaker 1: back to this, believe it or not, because the uh,
Speaker 1: the house in the garage will factor into the history
Speaker 1: of Palo Alto pretty significantly. Yeah. So August eighteen, n
Speaker 1: HP incorporates and Packard becomes the president of the company
Speaker 1: and Hewlett is the vice president of the company. And
Speaker 1: in that year the company generates eight hundred fifty one thousand,
Speaker 1: two hundred seven dollars in revenue and has one hundred
Speaker 1: eleven employees. So that's a pretty big jump. You know,
Speaker 1: this is still it's not even a decade old yet
Speaker 1: and uh, and it's doing quite well. Um. The the
Speaker 1: electronics industry is blossoming right now. This is still early
Speaker 1: days for electronics, keep in mind. Yeah, and so Hewlett
Speaker 1: Packards really on the cutting edge when it comes to
Speaker 1: creating electronic devices, specifically for other companies to help test
Speaker 1: their own equipment. Yep, yep, it's funny. I have a
Speaker 1: quote from Bill Hewlett that I got from the Hewlett
Speaker 1: Packard UH company timeline. Um. He said, quote, we just
Speaker 1: happened to be on the top of the rocket when
Speaker 1: it took off. We were here with electronic products. When
Speaker 1: electronics became a big thing, we went up with it.
Speaker 1: We don't deserve one damn bit of credit for the
Speaker 1: success of Hewlett Packard and quote right, um So, his
Speaker 1: point being that it was the right place at the
Speaker 1: right time, and anyone who had done that would have
Speaker 1: been successful. Although I think that's definitely a lot of
Speaker 1: modesty on his part. I think so too. Um. I
Speaker 1: think both of these guys obviously show a lot of
Speaker 1: um courage and willing to take a risk on a
Speaker 1: fairly new uh market. I think they also show a
Speaker 1: lot of creativity and leadership. Yeah. The fact that you know,
Speaker 1: you've got to remember both of them were both of
Speaker 1: them were engineers. Yes, so they came at this, they
Speaker 1: created this company from the perspective of engineers. They were
Speaker 1: not like business you know, students who let's come up
Speaker 1: with a company, what will it be about? Right exactly.
Speaker 1: These were guys who were problem solvers and then they
Speaker 1: built a company around that. And not that doesn't always
Speaker 1: work because the skill set to run a company and
Speaker 1: the skill set to be an engineer don't always overlap completely.
Speaker 1: Uh So, the fact that they were able to create
Speaker 1: this and make it work. That says a lot to
Speaker 1: their abilities. I think I think again that he was
Speaker 1: being quite modest with that that quote. I agree, So
Speaker 1: I just think it's funny that it shows this that
Speaker 1: you know their pluck and their their attitude behind the
Speaker 1: company right right, And you know what is important for
Speaker 1: us to focus on what their philosophy, you know, how
Speaker 1: how they felt about things, because that's gonna play an
Speaker 1: important role when we talk about HP the company as
Speaker 1: it is today, because there are a lot of things
Speaker 1: that you can point to where you know, you're like,
Speaker 1: how did the company that was this become the company
Speaker 1: that is this? It's not always positive or negative, but
Speaker 1: there are some significant differences. So in ninety HP produced
Speaker 1: the four B voltmeter. So still not anything that consumers
Speaker 1: would necessarily ever see. But um, the next thing I
Speaker 1: have is in nineteen fifty one, do you have anything before? Um? No,
Speaker 1: but just a general note from again from HPS. Overall
Speaker 1: timeline that uh, Palo Alto and and the time that
Speaker 1: they started this company was still fairly small. Of course,
Speaker 1: you know, Stanford is a very big university at least now,
Speaker 1: but I mean physically, um, but Palo Alto was was
Speaker 1: kind of a small ish town. And uh, this is
Speaker 1: right about the time in the nineteen fifties that Hewlett Packard,
Speaker 1: the company says that the city really started to boom
Speaker 1: in size. A lot of people started moving there, and
Speaker 1: a lot of people became interested in these fields electronics
Speaker 1: and well early computing technology, business machines. I would say
Speaker 1: at this point, um, and so it became a place
Speaker 1: to be. And I would argue again that this is
Speaker 1: partly due to the success of Hewlett Packard, because I'm
Speaker 1: sure people were watching. Yeah, and uh, I went in
Speaker 1: on that how do I get to be a famous engineer?
Speaker 1: Will you need to be in one of these companies
Speaker 1: like Hewlett Packard, because these guys are cutting edge? Yeah,
Speaker 1: and uh. In nineteen fifty one, they invent the company
Speaker 1: invents the high speed frequency counter, which counts frequencies. It's
Speaker 1: you say that like it's a bad thing. The model
Speaker 1: is five to four A. Yeah, and actually it reduced
Speaker 1: the amount of time needed to measure very high frequencies.
Speaker 1: So it was again a useful device for other companies. UM.
Speaker 1: And two, it introduced the two hundred A B and
Speaker 1: two hundred C D audio oscillators. Now, these oscillators replaced
Speaker 1: older oscillators in the the HP line, like the two
Speaker 1: and the two hundred B that we talked about, the
Speaker 1: ones that were introduced back in nineteen nine and nineteen Uh,
Speaker 1: those have been discontinued. They were they were outdated, and
Speaker 1: so the two and two c D were meant to
Speaker 1: too solve the same problems as the two, but they
Speaker 1: were both more versatile than the earlier models and more sophisticated.
Speaker 1: So it kind of shows that HP was sticking with
Speaker 1: its its roots. It hadn't really started to branch out
Speaker 1: into other kinds of electronics yet. Now the next thing
Speaker 1: I have is nineteen fifty six, are talking about the acilloscopes. Uh,
Speaker 1: well we have them. HP produced its first the selloscopes
Speaker 1: in But I was talking about a spinoff company that
Speaker 1: HP created, Yes, Yes, originally called Dinak and then later
Speaker 1: it was changed to Di mak U. Now in nineteen
Speaker 1: fifty six, HP created the spinoff company called Dinak originally,
Speaker 1: and it was um meant to create special purpose systems
Speaker 1: that used building blocks that HP created, so almost like
Speaker 1: modular systems in a way. You would think like a
Speaker 1: company would need a particular company would need a very
Speaker 1: specific set of hardware in order to accomplish particular tasks. Well,
Speaker 1: the purpose of Dinak later Dimack was to build these
Speaker 1: systems using mainly components designed by HP. So HP built
Speaker 1: the basic building blocks in DIMEK would assemble the systems. Now,
Speaker 1: do you know where they got how they came up
Speaker 1: with the name Dinak, or at least the the first
Speaker 1: two letters. I was gonna say, I'm sure it has
Speaker 1: to go with dynamic. Well it might be, but but
Speaker 1: really the right way they selled on d Y Okay,
Speaker 1: So hps logo lower lower case H, lower case P.
Speaker 1: You turn that upside down, it looks like a D
Speaker 1: and a Y. The H turns H turns into a LI,
Speaker 1: and the P turns into a D. So you turn
Speaker 1: it upside down, you got d Y. That's where I'm serious.
Speaker 1: That's really coin flips and turning logos upside down. That's
Speaker 1: how That's how HP roll rolled back in the day.
Speaker 1: It reminds me of that soda that seven Up created
Speaker 1: and flipped the letters upside down so it would be
Speaker 1: dn L. Yeah, so that's true though, that's so it
Speaker 1: was a spinoff company. Now later on we'll and we'll
Speaker 1: get to it. But later on the company will merge
Speaker 1: back with HP and become a division within HP. But
Speaker 1: I'll talk about that when it happens, but it weren't
Speaker 1: division yet. In ninetift there was also a monumental creation
Speaker 1: within the company h the Documentation of the HP Way,
Speaker 1: which had UH six and then later seven UH parts
Speaker 1: to it, and I actually have them written down, do
Speaker 1: you yes? I do so. Number one recognize that profit
Speaker 1: is the best measure of a company's country abution to society,
Speaker 1: and the ultimate source of corporate strength. Number two. Continually
Speaker 1: improve the value of the products and services offered to customers.
Speaker 1: Number three seek new opportunities for growth, but focus efforts
Speaker 1: on fields in which the company can make contribution. Number
Speaker 1: four provide employment opportunities that include the chance to share
Speaker 1: in the company's success. Number five. Maintain an organizational environment
Speaker 1: that fosters individual motivation, initiative, and creativity. Number six. Demonstrate
Speaker 1: good citizenship by making contributions to the community. Number seven
Speaker 1: emphasize growth as a requirement for survival. So this was
Speaker 1: sort of the foundation for HPS philosophy. And you can
Speaker 1: see in that a lot of a lot of interesting points.
Speaker 1: I mean obviously the emphasizing profitability, as say, this shows
Speaker 1: whether a corporation is doing is good or not, which
Speaker 1: you know, you can argue sometimes the most profitable is
Speaker 1: not always the best thing. But there are other elements
Speaker 1: within the HP way talking about contributing to the community
Speaker 1: and being a good corporate citizen that sort of helps
Speaker 1: balance out that first point so that you don't, you know, obviously,
Speaker 1: if it would come into conflict with being a good
Speaker 1: corporate citis and you would really have to question whether
Speaker 1: or not that's the best course of action. Uh. And
Speaker 1: this was a big deal the HP way, and in
Speaker 1: fact would become the title of a of a novel
Speaker 1: later on, or book really not a novel, it's not novel,
Speaker 1: it's a book. Uh yeah, but becomes the title of
Speaker 1: a book later on. It was, however, a novel idea
Speaker 1: it was, in fact, so that was a very important
Speaker 1: part of HP sort of corporate identity laying that out. Yes,
Speaker 1: and so I have n seven and I want to
Speaker 1: recommend to all of our listeners, if you have a
Speaker 1: time machine, go back to seven and get in, you know,
Speaker 1: maybe around November five or so, because on November six,
Speaker 1: Hewlett Packard had its first initial public offering of stock
Speaker 1: with and and each share was selling for the princely
Speaker 1: sum of sixteen dollars um. But there were two reasons
Speaker 1: behind it, what you're kind of funny. One of them
Speaker 1: was again a HP way. They wanted to help their
Speaker 1: UH employees to share, to have a share of the company,
Speaker 1: to have a share of its success. And they also
Speaker 1: wanted to plan out the estates for the founders. And well,
Speaker 1: I can't blame them. And by the way, if you
Speaker 1: do have that time machine and you go back to
Speaker 1: nineteen fifty seven to buy HP stocks at sixteen dollars,
Speaker 1: I highly recommend that you your second stop B and
Speaker 1: you sell that stock. And we'll explain why when we
Speaker 1: get into the later episodes of the HP story, because
Speaker 1: well we'll get there. Well, heck, I wish that I
Speaker 1: had the time machine so that I could go back
Speaker 1: to when I was going should I buy Apple stock
Speaker 1: for fifteen dollars? Yeah, I wish I could go dummy.
Speaker 1: I wish I could go back to when I was
Speaker 1: deciding whether or not to have the breakfast muffin or
Speaker 1: the breakfast quests on this morning, because I made the
Speaker 1: wrong choice. Okay, So anyway. So oh, also, um it
Speaker 1: UH started work in the Stanford Industrial Park in Palo Alto.
Speaker 1: Um and again they were build a new building yep,
Speaker 1: and they were working toward making it comfortable for their
Speaker 1: employees and more productive and run around. This time is
Speaker 1: when Palo Alto is actually becoming what we call Silicon
Speaker 1: Valley today. Yes, so yeah, that little tiny sleepy town
Speaker 1: is starting to become the center of an entire industry,
Speaker 1: one that's probably one of the most influential industries in
Speaker 1: the twenty centuries so far anyway. But they it's also
Speaker 1: because these guys were influential in convincing other people that
Speaker 1: they could start their own tech come and ease and
Speaker 1: make it big. So then in u n HP begins
Speaker 1: to create a division structure within the company. So in
Speaker 1: this case, HPS again trying to define its corporate structure.
Speaker 1: And they're bigger now and they have different kinds of
Speaker 1: stuff that they're doing and not just making measuring instruments anymore.
Speaker 1: But then again, you know, Packard and Hewlett were both engineers,
Speaker 1: and so they felt that a collaborative working environment was
Speaker 1: much more important than some sort of hierarchical, top down
Speaker 1: management system. So each division within HP was responsible for developing, producing,
Speaker 1: and marketing its own products. So you had all these
Speaker 1: different divisions within the company, but each one was almost
Speaker 1: its own autonomous unit, and it was under the umbrella
Speaker 1: of HP. But you know, the idea was that they
Speaker 1: didn't want to interfere or muddle with one division's work
Speaker 1: based upon you know, so arbitrary decision. Now, both Packard
Speaker 1: and Hewlett like to walk around and visit various employees
Speaker 1: and talk with them about their work and discuss what's
Speaker 1: going on and kind of share ideas, which was their
Speaker 1: walking around management style. Yeah, that that actually became its name.
Speaker 1: But they were famous for doing that and uh, which
Speaker 1: is probably also the genesis of the term the bosses
Speaker 1: coming look busy. But it actually they from what I've read,
Speaker 1: UH and in doing my research for the podcast, they
Speaker 1: didn't really have that problem because HP inspired, um, those
Speaker 1: early employees to work very hard because they felt their
Speaker 1: work was valued. Yep. And in nineteen HP acquired the F. L.
Speaker 1: Moseley Company, which produced graphic recorders, that being they would
Speaker 1: record things graphically. Not that you know that the recordings
Speaker 1: were graphic. Yes, I'm thinking that the description on the
Speaker 1: HP website. Probably uh, it would be better just to
Speaker 1: say this is where they started getting into printing. Yes,
Speaker 1: very early printing, and this was graphic recording the very
Speaker 1: first HP acquisition and finally for ninet for me anyway,
Speaker 1: you might have extra stuff. But Dave, Dave Packard typed
Speaker 1: up eleven simple rules, so this was part uh, he
Speaker 1: was doing this as part of the company had a
Speaker 1: management convention they would hold every year and and it
Speaker 1: was discovered later on in his correspondence file. But these
Speaker 1: were the eleven simple rules that Packard believed one should follow.
Speaker 1: Number one, think first of the other fellow. Number two.
Speaker 1: Build up the other person's sense of importance. Number three,
Speaker 1: Respect the other man's personality rights. Number four, give sincere appreciation, appreciation, appreciation,
Speaker 1: I'm having my little British moment again. Appreciate number five.
Speaker 1: Eliminate the negative number six. Avoid openly trying to reform
Speaker 1: people number seven. Try to understand the other person number eight,
Speaker 1: check first impressions number nine, take care of the little
Speaker 1: details number ten, develop genuine interest in people. Number eleven.
Speaker 1: Keep it up. So this was sort of his rules
Speaker 1: about just interacting with other people. And it's interesting again
Speaker 1: you know, kind of an engineer's way of looking at
Speaker 1: how do I interact with this person who is not me? Uh?
Speaker 1: And uh. I like that. It really puts a lot
Speaker 1: of emphasis on respecting the other person then getting to
Speaker 1: know that other person. And also you know, yes, you
Speaker 1: will get a first impression when you when you first
Speaker 1: meet someone, but keep in mind that a first impression
Speaker 1: may not be an accurate representation of who that person is.
Speaker 1: I mean, most people when they meet me think I'm
Speaker 1: really awesome, but you know, spend five minutes with me,
Speaker 1: and the whole whole jerk thing comes around. It's really
Speaker 1: not generally. Um, Okay, some first impression are accurate. But anyway, Yeah,
Speaker 1: this was this was sort of his um his philosophy
Speaker 1: on dealing with other people, and this became sort of
Speaker 1: a kind of a again, a philosophy of management style
Speaker 1: within HP. Yes, now I say that we conclude this
Speaker 1: podcast in nineteen fifty eight and we pick up again
Speaker 1: for part two in nineteen fifty nine. Okay, we can
Speaker 1: do that. Excellent. So this is part one of the
Speaker 1: HP story. We will continue with at least one more
Speaker 1: and probably two more parts because this is a very
Speaker 1: complex company that's done a lot of things, and it's
Speaker 1: in it's his storied history. So let's conclude here. If
Speaker 1: you guys have any suggestions that you would like us
Speaker 1: to cover in future episodes, let us know on Facebook
Speaker 1: or Twitter. Are handled. There is tech stuff h SW
Speaker 1: and Chris and I will talk to you again really soon.
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