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How did Hewlett-Packard become connected to the early history of Silicon Valley?

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Map of Silicon Valley with colored markers showing tech locations: blue historically important offices, green HQs, orange offices, and purple clusters across the Bay Area. — Silicon Valley Silicon Valley highlighting key historic tech offices, major tech headquarters, and offices with headquarters elsewhere.

Hewlett-Packard (HP) is central to the history of Silicon Valley because it served as a foundational model for the region's unique integration of academia and industry.

Founded in 1939 by Stanford University graduates William R. Hewlett and David Packard, the company was established in a Palo Alto garage at the encouragement of their professor, Frederick Terman. Terman, often called the father of Silicon Valley, actively mentored his students to launch local technology firms, fostering a culture where university research and private enterprise could thrive together.123

HP’s early success—notably providing audio oscillators for the film Fantasia and developing military technology during World War II—helped establish the region as a hub for sophisticated instrumentation. Later, HP became a key tenant of the Stanford Industrial Park, a development spearheaded by Terman to house high-technology firms, which solidified the area's status as a premier manufacturing region.123