American manufacturer of software and computer services. The company split in 2015 into two companies: HP Inc. and Hewlett Packard Enterprise. The company was founded on January 1, 1939, by William R. Hewlett and David Packard, two recent electrical-engineering graduates of Stanford University. It was the first of many technology companies to benefit from the ideas and support of engineering professor Frederick Terman, who pioneered the strong relationship between Stanford and what eventually emerged as Silicon Valley.