I had been asked in 2003 to write HP's nomination for this award. We were up against stiff competition, so it had to be good. During the process of writing, I had the pleasure of talking with people like Dick Hackborn and others who had been involved in the beginning of HP's inkjet story. I also had the pleasure of working with people like Senator Ron Wyden (OR) and Bill Gates as I drafted supporting letters for them to edit and sign.
Rather than describe the nomination details, I'll reproduce the abstract and two supporting letters.
First, the abstract:
Now, Dick Hackborn:
Hewlett Packard’s invention, development, and mass commercialization of thermal inkjet (“TIJ”) printing technology is among the greatest engineering and business breakthroughs in the history of the electronics and computing industry. Creative technical invention, high-stakes design decisions, product and process innovation across a wide range of electrotechnology disciplines (from organic chemical synthesis to supercomputer software development), highly disciplined development of several generations of technology and product platforms, and careful attention to customer needs and aspirations not only created the most successful product lines in HP history, but revolutionized the practice of information display.From sub-$50 personal printers to $15,000 60”-wide graphic arts printers, from portable “road warrior” printers to 12 ppm full-color printer/copiers, from consumer digital photography to professional reprographic services, TIJ has created, revolutionized, or substantially influenced markets ranging in size from $10Ms/year to $100Bs/year.The seminal inventions behind TIJ turned a 100-year old marking technique notorious for messiness and unreliability into the first choice for consumers and professional users across the world. When the full impact of TIJ on distributed printing and color imaging is considered, it is not an exaggeration to say that its historic and technological importance surpasses electrophotography.
... and finally, Bill Gates:
Dear IEEE Awards Committee:I am pleased to endorse the nomination of Hewlett-Packard Company to receive an IEEE Corporate Innovation Recognition Award for the invention, development and commercialization of thermal inkjet technology.As a senior executive with responsibility for the HP Peripherals Group during much of HP’s thermal inkjet development, I have witnessed the technical and business acumen that drove the birth of the technology and which continue to drive its evolution in a highly competitive marketplace. Innovation, determination to succeed, careful assessment of market opportunity against measurable development risks, and brilliant execution over more than two decades have allowed HP to deliver customer-appreciated value time and time again in markets ranging from office printing to home photography and beyond.In my mind, four visionary insights characterize HP’s road to thermal inkjet success:
- embracing non-impact printing (ink and laser)
- commitment to replaceable printhead / ink supply cartridge designs for low cost and high reliability
- recognition that color printing should initially be marketed as low incremental cost enhancement of high quality, low cost monochrome printing
- pioneering the development of home digital photo printing
Early experiments with laser printing technology led HP to realize the potential that non-impact technology held for revolutionizing digital printing. By shifting to drop on demand technologies, we believed that we could gain significant advantage over the fixed character impact technologies that dominated the computer peripheral market. The rallying cry became “do it with dots,” and we began to believe that we could eventually print anything using thermal inkjet technology.A second visionary departure from the norm came early in the development of TIJ technology when we made the commitment to use self-contained, replaceable printhead / ink supply cartridges. We believed this was the only way to create low cost, highly reliable drop on demand printing systems. Of course, this decision led to a succession of challenging technological and manufacturing innovations. But HP’s perseverance and commitment to this choice enabled the first HP Thinkjet printer and two decades of increasingly capable and reliable thermal inkjet printing products. Along the way, HP has created a portfolio of over 3000 patents across a wide range of technology domains.The introduction of the first HP Deskjet printer in 1988 marked a breakthrough in mass market office printing. It offered plain paper printing at industry-standard print resolution. It was the least expensive non-impact printer on the market, and it achieved good success. As rising volumes allowed us to lower costs and prices, we had a third major insight. Our own market research showed that customers were not looking for color printers. Industry speculation was that there was no mass market for inexpensive color printers. Sensing the opportunity to create a new market around the growing use of color PC monitors and applications, we decided to provide a different value proposition. We offered color printing (in a separate, replaceable cartridge) as a low cost addition to monochrome printing. This breakthrough thinking enabled an entire new class of opportunities for PC-based publishing and presentations.A fourth key insight in HP’s thermal inkjet story came with the realization that low cost sensors would soon enable the digitization of photos through scanners and digital cameras. Once photographic content was digitized, it would be natural to share it, manage it, and print it digitally as well. Thermal inkjet technology had the potential to enable low cost home digital photography solutions. HP made a serious commitment to this digital photography vision about 10 years ago. The drive to achieve photo quality printing led us to push thermal inkjet technology beyond any previous limits in areas such as ink drop size, media composition, ink and media interactions, writing system designs, imaging pipelines, and number of firing chambers for each photo printing color. Today’s home photo printing systems employ up to eight different inks and deliver true photo-realistic results that surpass traditional analog photography in both image quality and print durability.HP’s wide range of sustained thermal inkjet technology breakthroughs and innovation over more than two decades make HP an outstanding candidate for this prestigious award. The pace of innovation and market creation continue today, as HP continues to push the limits of thermal technology into new frontiers of medical systems, silicon micromachining, 3-D printing, and beyond.Sincerely,Dick Hackborn
Next: 2005: HP and CTO Changes
Dear IEEE Awards Committee:I am pleased to recommend Hewlett-Packard Company for the 2003 IEEE Corporate Innovation Recognition Award for the invention, development and commercialization of thermal inkjet (TIJ) printing technology.HP’s rapid pace of development of inkjet printing technology has had a profound effect on many markets for more than two decades. Through solid relationships with companies like Microsoft, HP has delivered wave after wave of innovation and has changed the face of technology for customers and business partners.By constantly innovating to drive performance up and cost down, HP has made TIJ-based printing the universal standard for a wide range of applications from enterprise desktop printing to high performance commercial graphics to all-in-one devices for SOHO markets to personal printers for creative homes and schools.In many ways, the development of the personal computing industry and the development of low cost, high quality, quiet, HP TIJ printers are intertwined. From the initial HP Thinkjet product which enabled the replacement of fixed-font impact printers to the HP Deskjet printers which helped to make color relevant in the office to today’s HP Photosmart printers that are helping to cause a revolution in digital imaging, HP’s TIJ technology has been a key part of a strong business and technology partnership between HP and Microsoft. Amazing breakthroughs in hardcopy price and performance have helped to fuel the demand for more and more computing capability to support a diverse set of customer experiences. This, in turn, has helped to accelerate the pace of innovation and customer demand for better operating system and application software for over 20 years.HP continues to innovate today and is driving the creation of a new ecosystem of opportunity based on true photographic quality digital imaging for consumers. I am pleased to support HP’s nomination for this prestigious award.Sincerely,Bill Gates, ChairmanMicrosoft Corporation
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