The Hewlett-Packard Company, commonly shortened to Hewlett-Packard  or HP, is an American multinational information technology company. It is headquartered in Palo Alto, California. HP develops and provides a wide variety of hardware components, as well as software and related services to consumers, small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), and large enterprises, including customers in the 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. It initially produced a line of electronic test and measurement equipment. The HP Garage at 367 Addison Avenue is now designated an official California Historical Landmark and is marked with a plaque calling it the “Birthplace of ‘Silicon Valley‘”.

PRODUCTS

HP produces lines of printers, scanners, digital cameras, calculators, personal digital assistants, servers, workstation computers, and computers for home and small-business use. Many of the computers came from the 2002 merger with Compaq.

HP as of 2001 promoted itself as supplying not just hardware and software, but also a full range of services to design, implement, and support IT infrastructure.