In the world of technology, there are a number high flyers that nearly everyone has heard of. Google, Yahoo, Hotmail and Motorola are just some of the biggest. The question that many people ask themselves is how did these top brands come up with their names? If you are looking to start your own business then you may be struggling with a name that will be memorable. Below you will find out how the top 12 Internet giants got their names.
1. Google
Originally named ‘Googol’ this well known search engine was created by Larry Page and Sergey Brin. They came up with Googol as it is the word that represents the number 1 followed by one hundred zeros. They got sent a cheque from their angel investor to “Google”, and the name stuck.
2. Microsoft
Bill Gates originally created Micro-Soft but later took out the – to give it the name we all now know and love. It was the best name to describe what the company offers - Microcomputer Software.
3. Yahoo
Jonathon Swift was the guy who invented this word and it was used in the book “Gulliver’s Travels”. It means somebody who is repulsive to look at and they are almost not human. The reason the founders of Yahoo (Jerry Yang and David Filo) chose this name was because they considered themselves to fit this description. More about the way the company started can be found at http://docs.yahoo.com/info/misc/history.html
4. Sun Microsystems
Four friends from Stanford university came up with the name. The word Sun is an acronym for Stanford University Network.
5. Xerox
The name Xerox was given to the company by Chestor Carlson and it adequately describes what the business offers. The literal meaning of the word ‘Xer’ is dry, and the company offers dry copying.
6. Motorola
Motorola was thought up by Paul Galvin, the founder of the company. It was at the time when the company started creating car radios hence the Motor part of the name. The company now runs a successful blog that provides all of the latest company news http://www.motorolanews.com/.
7. Oracle
When Bob Oats and Larry Ellison were working on a consultancy project for Central Intelligence Agency, the code name given was Oracle. That is how their company got its name.
8. Sony
The word Sony comes from two separate Latin words. Firstly the word Sonus means sound , and then the word Sonny is a slang word used by Americans to describe kids that are really intelligent. Sony is now one of the largest technology names in the world. You can keep up with the latest news at http://blog.discover.sonystyle.com/.
9. Red Hat
When Marc Ewing was in college, his grandfather gave him a Cornell Lacrosse Team Cap which featured red and white stripes. After losing it he searched desperately for it to no avail. When he created the manual for the test version of Red Hat Linux, he placed an appeal asking anyone if they had seen it.
10. Lotus
The founder of the company, Mitch Kapor, used to be a teacher of what has traditionally become known as Yoga. The name is one of the poses, otherwise known as “padmasana”.
11. Hewlett Packard
There were two original names that were going to be used for this company. One was the name that it now has and the other was Packard-Hewlett. The founders, Dave Packard and Bill Hewlett literally flipped a coin to see which way round the names would go.
12. Apple Computers
Apples are the favourite fruit of Steve Jobs, the founder of the company. He gave his employees up until 5pm to think of a better name than Apple Computers. Nobody did and so it ended up with that name.
As you can see there is a whole host of reasons why companies get their names. Some logical, and others humorous. When it comes to choosing a name for your business, take your time and think outside the box. You could be about to launch the next big thing!
This was a blog post by Lior Levin who works for a psd to html developer and also is an advisor to an applicant tracking software company from new york.
Very interesting article. Who would've thought, right? "Googol" would be really funny though if this was pushed through, but then again, people would've gotten used to it.
Posted by: Wesley Wise | Jun 27, 2011 at 01:27 PM