Its development began in 1939, when Frederick Terman, a professor of electrical engineering at Stanford University, encouraged his students William Hewlett and David Packard to turn the audio oscillator they had designed into a commercial product. Terman even negotiated the bank loan that got them started.
1939 年史丹福大學電機系教授 Frederick Terman 鼓勵他的兩位學生 Hewlett 和 Packard，將設計的聲頻震盪器作成商品，並幫他們洽商銀行貸款。