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Active Worlds is an online virtual world , developed by ActiveWorlds Inc., a company based in Newburyport, Massachusetts , and launched on June 28, 1995. Users assign themselves a name, log into the Active Worlds universe , and explore 3D virtual worlds and environments that others have built. Active Worlds allows users to own worlds and universes, and develop custom 3D content. The browser has web browsing capabilities, as well as voice chat , and basic instant messaging features.

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63-563: In the summer of 1994, Ron Britvich created WebWorld , the first 2.5D world where tens of thousands could chat, build and travel. WebWorld operated on the Peregrine Systems Inc. servers as an after-hours project until Britvich left the company to join Knowledge Adventure Worlds (KAW) in the fall of that year. In February 1995, KAW spun off their 3D Web division to form the company Worlds Inc. Britvich

126-749: A Fortune 500 ranking of 9 in 2009. In November 2009, HP announced its acquisition of 3Com , and closed the deal on April 12, 2010. On April 28, 2010, HP announced its buyout of Palm, Inc. for $ 1.2 billion. On September 2, 2010, HP won its bidding war for 3PAR with a $ 33 a share offer ($ 2.07 billion), which Dell declined to match. On November 1, 2015, Hewlett-Packard was split into two separate companies. Its enterprise products and services business were spun-off to form Hewlett Packard Enterprise , while its personal computer and printer businesses became HP Inc. Bill Hewlett and David Packard graduated with degrees in electrical engineering from Stanford University in 1935. The company started in

189-574: A Series One computer while developing an MVS version. The MVS client/server solutions for PNMS became available in 1995. In 1989, John Moores , founder of BMC Software and owner of the San Diego Padres Major League Baseball team, became a member of the Peregrine board of directors. He served as chairman from March 1990 through July 2000 and then again in 2002. He resigned from the board in 2003 during

252-547: A garage in Palo Alto during a fellowship they had with past professor Frederick Terman at Stanford during the Great Depression , whom they considered a mentor in forming the company. In 1938, Packard and Hewlett began part-time work in a rented garage with an initial capital investment of US$ 538 (equivalent to $ 11,645 in 2023). In 1939, Hewlett and Packard decided to formalize their partnership. They tossed

315-643: A Fortune-20 company in the Dow Jones Industrial Average . Fiorina received a larger signing offer than any of her predecessors. The same year, Fiorina articulated a set of " rules of the garage ", an attempt to capture the spirit of the company's founders. In 1997, HP started selling its products in Iran through a European subsidiary and a Dubai -based Middle Eastern distributor, despite U.S. export sanctions prohibiting such deals imposed by Bill Clinton 's 1995 executive orders . The story

378-466: A coin to decide whether the company they founded would be called Hewlett-Packard (HP) or Packard-Hewlett. Hewlett and Packard's first financially successful product was a precision audio oscillator known as the HP 200A , which used a small incandescent light bulb (known as a "pilot light") as a temperature dependent resistor in a critical portion of the circuit, and a negative feedback loop to stabilize

441-611: A definitive agreement to acquire Opsware in a cash tender deal that values the company at $ 14.25 per share, which combined Opsware software with the Oracle enterprise IT management software. In the first few years of Hurd's tenure as CEO, HP's stock price more than doubled. By the end of the 2007 fiscal year, HP reached the $ 100 billion mark for the first time. The company's annual revenue reached $ 104 billion , allowing HP to overtake competitor IBM. On May 13, 2008, HP and Electronic Data Systems (EDS) announced that they had signed

504-593: A definitive agreement under which HP would purchase EDS. On June 30, HP announced that the waiting period under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Antitrust Improvements Act of 1976 had expired. "The transaction still requires EDS stockholder approval and regulatory clearance from the European Commission and other non-U.S. jurisdictions and is subject to the satisfaction or waiver of the other closing conditions specified in

567-564: A federal grand jury issued an indictment charging eight former executives of Peregrine Systems, Inc., one former outside auditor of Peregrine, and two outside business partners of Peregrine, with conspiracy to commit a multibillion-dollar securities fraud. The case resulted from an investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the Securities and Exchange Commission had pursued a parallel civil enforcement action. In 2003,

630-522: A foreign subsidiary. HP ended its relationship with Redington Gulf after the SEC inquiry. On September 3, 2001, HP announced that an agreement had been reached with Compaq to merge the two companies. On May 3, 2002, after passing a shareholder vote, HP officially announced the merger with Compaq. Prior to this, plans had been in place to consolidate the companies' product teams and product lines. The newly-merged company would officially launch five days after

693-789: A manufacturing plant was established in Böblingen and a marketing organization in Geneva . Packard handed the presidency over to Hewlett when he became chairman in 1964, but remained CEO of the company. HP is recognized as the symbolic founder of Silicon Valley , though it did not actively investigate semiconductor devices until a few years after the " traitorous eight " abandoned William Shockley to create Fairchild Semiconductor in 1957. Hewlett-Packard's HP Associates division, established around 1960, developed semiconductor devices primarily for internal use. Instruments and calculators were some of their products using semiconductor devices. During

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756-543: A proprietary magnetic tape for storage. HP computers were similar in capabilities to the much later IBM Personal Computer , though the limitations of available technology forced prices to be high. In 1978, Hewlett stepped down as CEO and was succeeded by John A. Young . HP expanded into South Africa in the 1980s. Activists supporting divestment from South Africa accused HP of "automating apartheid ". Sales reached $ 6.5 billion in 1985 with 85,000 employees. In 1984, HP introduced both inkjet and laser printers for

819-469: A question & answer session revolving around the incident on the Vinesauce subreddit under the pseudonym "Pocketomi". Peregrine Systems Peregrine Systems, Inc. was an enterprise software company, founded in 1981, that sold enterprise asset management , change management , and ITIL -based IT service management software. Following an accounting scandal and bankruptcy in 2003, Peregrine

882-737: A range of printers and other imaging products. The company directly marketed its products to households; small- to medium-sized businesses and enterprises, as well as via online distribution; consumer-electronics and office-supply retailers; software partners; and major technology vendors. It also offered services and a consulting business for its products and partner products. In 1999, HP spun off its electronic and bio-analytical test and measurement instruments business into Agilent Technologies ; HP retained focus on its later products, including computers and printers. It merged with Compaq in 2002, and acquired Electronic Data Systems in 2008, which led to combined revenues of $ 118.4 billion that year and

945-546: A reputation for sturdiness and usability. HP introduced the Hewlett-Packard Interface Bus (HPIB) computer peripheral interface (later cloned by National Instruments as GPIB and standardized by the IEEE as IEEE-488 ) on their relay actuator products in 1973. HPIB was later integrated into most high end test & measurement equipment it produced from 1980 onward. As early as 1977, HP began production of

1008-454: A result, no viewers were able to log in during the stream. The incident, described as creepypasta -like, led to speculation that the character was part of an ARG , and restored interest in the virtual world. It was later revealed that Fujiko was a viewer of Vinny's streams and a former frequenter of Active Worlds who had decided to revisit the game during Vinny's own playthrough of it as a means of entertaining herself; she later participated in

1071-467: A simple accumulator -based design with two accumulator registers and, in the HP 1000 models, two index registers . The series was produced for 20 years in spite of several attempts to replace it, and was a forerunner of the HP 9800 and HP 250 series of desktop and business computers. At the end of 1968, Packard handed over the duties of CEO to Hewlett to become United States Deputy Secretary of Defense in

1134-506: A wide variety of hardware components, as well as software and related services to consumers, small and medium-sized businesses ( SMBs ), and fairly large companies, including customers in government, health, and education sectors. The company was founded in a one-car garage in Palo Alto by Bill Hewlett and David Packard in 1939, and initially produced a line of electronic test and measurement equipment. The HP Garage at 367 Addison Avenue

1197-567: A workstation, and software to manage them—OpenView Client Configuration Manager 2.0. In that same year, HP's share price skyrocketed due to consistent results in the last couple quarters of the year with Hurd's plan to cut back HP's workforce and lower costs. HP began its marketing campaign called "The Computer is Personal Again" in May 2006, aimed at bringing back the personal computer as a personal product. The campaign utilized viral marketing and sophisticated visuals, as well as its own website. Some of

1260-429: Is now designated an official California Historical Landmark, and is marked with a plaque calling it the "Birthplace of ' Silicon Valley ' ". The company won its first big contract in 1938 to provide the HP 200B , a variation of its first product, the HP 200A low-distortion frequency oscillator for Walt Disney 's production of the 1940 animated film Fantasia , which allowed Hewlett and Packard to formally establish

1323-479: The Apple I computer while working at HP and offered it to them under their right of first refusal to his work. They did not take it up as the company wanted to stay in scientific, business, and industrial markets. Wozniak said that HP "turned him down five times", but that his loyalty to HP made him hesitant to start Apple with Steve Jobs . The company earned global respect for a variety of products. They introduced

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1386-548: The HP IT Management Software (BTO) portfolio within the HP Software Division . Hewlett-Packard The Hewlett-Packard Company , commonly shortened to Hewlett-Packard ( / ˈ h juː l ɪ t ˈ p æ k ər d / HEW -lit PAK -ərd ) or HP , was an American multinational information technology company headquartered in Palo Alto, California . HP developed and provided

1449-539: The HP Pavilion dv1000 series of laptops in 2004, which included the HP Pavilion dv1658 and dv1040 models. Other laptop models available around this time were the dv4000, dv5000, and the dv8000 series. In January 2005, following years of underperformance, which included HP's Compaq merger that fell short and disappointing earning reports, the board asked Fiorina to resign as chair and chief executive officer of

1512-469: The 1960s, HP partnered with Sony and Yokogawa Electric in Japan to develop several high-quality products. The products were not a huge success, as there were high costs involved in building HP-looking products in Japan. In 1963, HP and Yokogawa formed the joint venture Yokogawa-Hewlett-Packard to market HP products in Japan. HP bought Yokogawa Electric's share of Hewlett-Packard Japan in 1999. HP spun off

1575-422: The 2000-2002 fiscal years. In 2003, the former Peregrine CFO, Matthew Gless, pleaded guilty to fraud charges. In 2008, the former Peregrine CEO, Stephen Gardner, was sentenced to eight years and one month in prison for his role in the fraud, which resulted in bankruptcy for the company. Although former chairman of the board, John Moores, sold more than $ 800 million of shares during Peregrine's fraudulent period,

1638-540: The HP856x spectrum analyzers to complement its RF power meters and sensors capable of measuring signals in excess of 20 GHz. HP also produced configurable chassis based sweep generators capable of generating signals to 20 GHz. Other T&M products of the time included lab grade multimeters, microwave frequency counters, RF amplifiers, high accuracy microwave detectors, lab grade power supplies and more. These products were succeeded by modernized versions as well as

1701-634: The Hewlett-Packard Company on July 2, 1939. The company grew into a multinational corporation widely respected for its products. HP was the world's leading PC manufacturer from 2007 until the second quarter of 2013, when Lenovo moved ahead of HP. HP specialized in developing and manufacturing computing, data storage, and networking hardware; designing software; and delivering services. Major product lines included personal computing devices, enterprise and industry standard servers, related storage devices, networking products, software, and

1764-617: The Model 400A vacuum-tube voltmeter during the war. Hewlett and Packard worked on counter-radar technology and artillery shell proximity fuzes during World War II; the work exempted Packard from the draft, but Hewlett had to serve as an officer in the Army Signal Corps after being called to active duty. HP was incorporated on August 18, 1947, with Packard as president. Sales reached $ 5.5 million in 1951 with 215 employees. The company went public on November 6, 1957. In 1959,

1827-475: The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission charged Peregrine with "massive financial fraud" for the purposes of inflating the company's revenue and stock price. Peregrine, without admitting or denying the allegations of the complaint, agreed to a partial settlement. Peregrine filed suit against its auditor Arthur Andersen in 2002 for $ 1 billion in damages, for allegedly allowing incorrect audits that overstated revenues by as much as $ 250 million to be filed for

1890-588: The Year" in 2003, which in turn published a press release stating that "[t]he seeds of the Redington-Hewlett-Packard relationship were sowed six years ago for one market — Iran." At the time, Redington Gulf had only three employees whose sole purpose was to sell HP products to the Iran market. According to former officials who worked on sanctions, HP used a loophole by routing their sales through

1953-486: The ads featured Pharrell , Petra Nemcova , Mark Burnett , Mark Cuban , Alicia Keys , Jay-Z , Gwen Stefani , and Shaun White . This marketing campaign was also incorporated directly onto HP's product offerings, which included desktops, laptops, and other hardware and software. HP offered three new laptop models in mid-to-late 2006 with the Pavilion dv2000 , dv6000 , and dv9000 series. In July 2007, HP signed

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2016-497: The amplitude of the output sinusoidal waveform. This allowed the HP 200A to be sold for $ 89.40 when competitors were selling less stable oscillators for over $ 200 . The 200 series of generators continued production until at least 1972 as the 200AB, still tube-based but improved in design through the years. One of the company's earliest customers was Bud Hawkins, chief sound engineer for Walt Disney Studios , who bought eight HP 200B audio oscillators (at $ 71.50 each) to be used in

2079-472: The animated film Fantasia . HP's profit at the end of 1939, its first full year of business, was $ 1,563 (equivalent to $ 34,236 in 2023) on revenues of $ 5,369 . In 1942, they built their first building at 395 Page Mill Road and were awarded the Army-Navy "E" Award in 1943. HP employed 200 people and produced the audio oscillator, a wave analyzer, distortion analyzers, an audio-signal generator, and

2142-577: The announcement on May 7, 2002. As Compaq acquired Tandem Computers in 1997 and Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) in 1998, HP inherited both acquired companies' product lines, and offered support for the Tandem NonStop family (now owned by Hewlett Packard Enterprise) and DEC products PDP-11 , VAX and Alpha . Both the DEC PDP-11 and VAX were discontinued years before the merger, and HP supported DEC Alpha until April 2007. The merger

2205-419: The company increased the price of their yearly citizenships from US$ 19.95 to US$ 69.95. In June 2008, Active Worlds, Inc. released the first major update to the browser in two years, version 4.2. It included web page rendering on objects and customizable avatars. In June 2009, Active Worlds, Inc. released an open beta of version 5.0 to the public. In June 2012, version 6.0 was released. The system's registration fee

2268-572: The company produced contract projects for Disney and others. In June 1995, AlphaWorld was renamed Active Worlds (from Active Worlds Explorer) and officially launched as version 1.0. Around this time, Circle of Fire (CoF) was formed to create content for the Active Worlds universe. This company played a pivotal role in the future of the product. In January 1997, Worlds Inc., after failing to secure needed contracts and having spent its venture investment of over 15 million dollars, laid off almost

2331-449: The company shortly thereafter and invested funds in COF to continue the expansion of Active Worlds . In January 1999, COF performed a reverse merger with Vanguard Enterprises, Inc., and changed the company's name to Activeworlds.com, Inc. and became a publicly traded company on Nasdaq under the symbol AWLD. In 2001, the company launched a new product called 3D Homepages . Each citizen account

2394-629: The company's bankruptcy filing. His involvement in the software industry continues today with investments through his venture capital firm JMI Equity. The legacy of his investments has been focused on ITSM software packages with the most recent investments made in ServiceNow . Peregrine had offices in the Americas, Europe and Asia Pacific and grew its product line rapidly both organically and via acquisitions, including Harbinger Corporation in 2000, and Remedy Corporation in 2001. In 2004,

2457-514: The company, and she did on February 9, 2005. After her departure, HP's stock jumped 6.9 percent. Robert Wayman, chief financial officer of HP, served as interim CEO while the board undertook a formal search for a replacement. Mark Hurd of NCR Corporation was hired to take over as CEO and president, effective April 1, 2005. Hurd was the board's top choice given the revival of NCR that took place under his leadership. In 2006, HP unveiled several new products including desktops, enhanced notebooks,

2520-435: The court of appeals determined that there was insufficient evidence that Moores knew about the fraud that led to the company's bankruptcy. Charges dismissed: Peregrine filed for Chapter 11 protection on September 23, 2002, after laying off 1400 employees, or nearly half its workforce. When Peregrine filed for federal bankruptcy protection and eventually canceled its common stocks, more than $ 4 billion in shareholder equity

2583-477: The decade, HP opened hpshopping.com as an independent subsidiary to sell online, direct to consumers; in 2005, the store was renamed "HP Home & Home Office Store". From 1995 to 1999, Hewlett-Packard were sponsors of the English football team Tottenham Hotspur . In 1999, all of the businesses not related to computers, storage, and imaging were spun off from HP to form Agilent Technologies . Agilent's spin-off

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2646-404: The desktop. Along with its scanner product line, the printers have later been developed into successful multifunction products, the most significant being single-unit printer/scanner/copier/fax machines. The print mechanisms in HP's LaserJet line of laser printers depend almost entirely on Canon Inc. 's components (print engines), which in turn use technology developed by Xerox . HP developed

2709-407: The entire staff of the company, keeping only several employees which included the author of Gamma, now known as WorldsPlayer . Active Worlds , never considered much of an asset by the company, became an object of struggle for those close to it. Circle of Fire (COF) run by Richard Noll purchased all of the assets of Active Worlds and hired many of the Active Worlds developers. JP McCormick joined

2772-436: The first bit mapped graphics displays that, when combined with the HP 2100 21MX F-Series microcoded Scientific Instruction Set, enabled the first commercial WYSIWYG presentation program , BRUNO , that later became the program HP-Draw on the HP 3000. Although scoffed at in the formative days of computing, HP surpassed IBM as the world's largest technology vendor in terms of sales. HP was identified by Wired magazine as

2835-607: The hardware, firmware, and software to convert data into dots for printing. On March 3, 1986, HP registered the HP.com domain name, making it the ninth Internet .com domain to be registered. In 1987, the Palo Alto garage where Hewlett and Packard started their business was designated as a California Historical Landmark . In the 1990s, HP expanded their computer product line, which initially had been targeted at university, research, and business users, to reach consumers. HP also grew through acquisitions: it bought Apollo Computer in 1989 and Convex Computer in 1995. In 1992, Young

2898-546: The incoming Nixon administration. He resumed the chairmanship in 1972 and served until 1993, but Hewlett remained the CEO. The HP 3000 was an advanced stack-based design for a business computing server, later redesigned with RISC technology. The HP 2640 series of smart and intelligent terminals introduced forms-based interfaces to ASCII terminals, and also introduced screen labeled function keys , now commonly used on gas pumps and bank ATMs. The HP 2640 series included one of

2961-471: The introduction of the scalar and vector network analyzer product lines prior to the business being spun off into Agilent Technologies . The HP 9800 series of technical desktop computers started in 1971 with the 9810A. The HP Series 80 started in 1979 with the 85. Some of these machines used a version of the BASIC programming language , which was available immediately after they were switched on, and used

3024-457: The merger agreement." The agreement was finalized on August 26, 2008, at $ 13 billion, and it was publicly announced that EDS would be re-branded. The first targeted layoff of 24,600 former EDS workers was announced on September 15, 2008. (The company's 2008 annual report gave the number as 24,700, to be completed by end of 2009. ) This round was factored into purchase price as a $ 19.5 billion liability against goodwill. As of September 23, 2009, EDS

3087-488: The producer of the world's first device to be called a personal computer: the Hewlett-Packard 9100A , introduced in 1968. HP called it a desktop calculator because, as Hewlett said: "If we had called it a computer, it would have been rejected by our customers' computer gurus because it didn't look like an IBM . We therefore decided to call it a calculator, and all such nonsense disappeared." An engineering triumph at

3150-468: The significance of the alliance and also key letters from the two companies H ewlett- P ackard and Compa q (the latter company being famous for incorporating the letter "Q" on its logo for all of their products). HP then went on to become a major producer in desktop computers , laptops, and servers for many different markets. Mscape was a mobile media gaming platform that could be used to create location-based games originating in 2002. HP released

3213-566: The small company Dynac to specialize in digital equipment. The name was picked so that the HP logo could be turned upside down to be a reflected image of the logo of the new company. Dynac was eventually renamed Dymec and folded back into HP in 1959. HP experimented with using Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) minicomputers with its instruments, but entered the computer market in 1966 with the HP 2100 / HP 1000 series of minicomputers after it decided that it would be easier to build another small design team than deal with DEC. The minicomputers had

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3276-489: The time, the logic circuit was produced without any integrated circuits , and the CPU assembly was entirely executed in discrete components. With CRT display, magnetic-card storage, and printer, the price was around $ 5,000. The machine's keyboard was a cross between the keyboard of a scientific calculator and the keyboard of an adding machine. There was no alphabetic keyboard. Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak originally designed

3339-609: The world's first handheld scientific electronic calculator in 1972 (the HP-35 ), the first handheld programmable in 1974 (the HP-65 ), the first alphanumeric, programmable, expandable in 1979 (the HP-41 C), and the first symbolic and graphing calculator, the HP-28C . Like their scientific and business calculators, HP oscilloscopes , logic analyzers , and other measurement instruments had

3402-652: Was acquired by Hewlett-Packard in 2005. Micro Focus which merged with the HP Software Division in 2017, later marketed the Peregrine products as part of its IT Service Management solutions. Micro Focus was acquired by OpenText in 2023. Peregrine Systems was founded in 1981 in Irvine, California . The founders and employees were Chris Cole, Gary Story, Ed Beck, Kevin Keyes and Richard Diederich. They started selling Peregrine Network Management System (PNMS) on

3465-414: Was entitled to a free 30-day trial of a virtual 10,000 square-meter 3D world, using their choice of layout from a selection of pre-designed styles. After the trial, the user had the option of upgrading to a larger size and user limit. These 3D Homepages were hosted for the user, unlike traditional worlds where the user would have to get their world hosted by another company or user, or themselves. In 2002,

3528-413: Was eventually joined by several other developers, and the renamed AlphaWorld continued to develop as a skunkworks project at Worlds Inc, internally competing with a similar project known internally as Gamma and publicly as Worlds Chat . While AlphaWorld was developing a strong cult following due in large part to Britvich's open philosophy of favoring user-built content, Worlds, Inc. favored Gamma for

3591-484: Was initially reported by The Boston Globe , and it triggered an inquiry by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). HP responded that products worth US$ 120 million were sold in fiscal year 2008 for distribution via Redington Gulf, a company based in the Netherlands, and that as these sales took place through a foreign subsidiary, HP had not violated sanctions. HP named Redington Gulf "Wholesaler of

3654-441: Was known as HP Enterprise Services (now known as DXC Technology ). On November 11, 2009, 3Com and Hewlett-Packard announced that the latter would be acquiring 3Com for $ 2.7 billion in cash. The acquisition was one of the biggest in size among a series of takeovers and acquisitions by technology giants to push their way to become one-stop shops. Since the beginning of the financial crisis in 2007, tech giants have constantly felt

3717-554: Was lost. After filing, the company sold the Remedy division of the company to BMC Software for more than $ 300 million. Peregrine exited Chapter 11 reorganization in August 2003, and the president and CEO, Gary Greenfield, left the company. Retired software executive John Mutch became president and CEO in August 2003. Hewlett-Packard acquired Peregrine Systems in 2005 for $ 425 million. The Peregrine products are now sold as part of

3780-424: Was preceded by a proxy fight in 2001 with numerous large HP shareholders as well as the sons of the co-founders, with Bill Hewlett's son Walter objecting to the merger, only approving it reluctantly. HP's pre-merger ticker symbol was "HWP". After the merger with Compaq, the new ticker symbol became "HPQ", which was announced on May 6, 2002. "HPQ" is a combination of the two previous symbols, "HWP" and "CPQ", to show

3843-453: Was removed in 2013. In March 2016, the platform made headlines when YouTuber and Twitch streamer Vinny of the streaming group Vinesauce explored and came across a user by the name of "Hitomi Fujiko", who he assumed to be a non-player character , but who clearly showed signs of life as the stream continued. The stream was viewed by roughly 6,000 people, and caused the platform's login servers to crash due to an overload of registrations. As

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3906-406: Was succeeded by Lewis E. Platt , and in 1993 and Hewlett and Packard stepped down from the board with Platt succeeding Packard as chairman. In 1993, HP acquired Advanced Design System from Pathwave. The ADS suite of RF simulation tools was spun off into Agilent in 1999 along with related T&M business units, all of which were carried forward into the spinoff of Agilent into Keysight. Later in

3969-410: Was the largest initial public offering in the history of Silicon Valley , and it created an $ 8 billion company with about 30,000 employees, manufacturing scientific instruments , semiconductors , optical networking devices, and electronic test equipment for telecom and wireless, research and development , and production. In July 1999, HP appointed Carly Fiorina as the first female CEO of

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