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History

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Founding edit Compaq was founded in February 1982 by Rod Canion, Jim Harris, and Bill Murto, three senior managers from semiconductor manufacturer Texas Instruments. The three of them had left due to lack of faith and loss of confidence in TI's management, and initially considered but ultimately decided against starting a chain of Mexican restaurants. Each invested $1,000 to form the company, which was founded with the temporary name Gateway Technology. The name "COMPAQ" was said to be derived from "Compatibility and Quality" but this explanation was an afterthought. The name was chosen from many suggested by Ogilvy & Mather, it being the name least rejected. The first Compaq PC was sketched out on a placemat by Ted Papajohn while dining with the founders in a pie shop, (named House of Pies in Houston). Their first venture capital came from Benjamin M. Rosen and Sevin Rosen Funds, who helped the fledgling company secure $1.5 million to produce their initial ...
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Sponsorship

Before its merger with HP, Compaq sponsored the Williams Formula One team when it was still powered by BMW engines. HP inherited and continued the sponsorship deal for a few years.
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Competitors

Compaq originally competed directly against IBM, manufacturing computer systems equivalent with the IBM PC, as well as Apple Computer. In the 1990s, as IBM's own PC division declined, Compaq faced other IBM PC Compatible manufacturers like Dell Computer, Packard Bell, AST Research, and Gateway 2000. By the mid-1990s, Compaq's price war had enabled it to overtake IBM and Apple, while other IBM PC Compatible manufacturers such as Packard Bell and AST were driven from the market. Dell became the number-one supplier of PCs in 2001. At the time of their 2002 merger, Compaq and HP were the second and third largest PC manufacturers, so their combination made them number one. However, the combined HP-Compaq struggled and fell to second place behind Dell from 2003 to 2006. Due to Dell's struggles in late 2006, HP has led all PC vendors from 2007 to 2012. During its existence as a division of HP, Compaq primarily competed against other budget-oriented personal computer series from ma...
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