HP Labs: singular! 3 For 25 years, HP Laboratories has led HP's long-range research. page 10 Driving up quality at Ford 10 Ford and HP team to develop an electronic toolbox for automobiles. Your turn 14 History in a box 15 HP's professional archives is a treasure-trove ofinformation. Open for business: Silicon Valley's new garage 19 A million people a year are expected to visit a new high-tech exhibit. People 22 Jim Hanley's interests range from high tech to primitive art. No room for dinosaurs 25 1990 was a classic example ofthe constant need to adapt to change. Letter from John Young 27 John explains how HP's new organizational structure is taking shape. ExtraMeasure 29 MEASURE Editor: Associate editor: Art Director: Graphic designer: Circulation: Jay Coleman Betty Gerard Annette Yatovitz Thomas J. Brown Kathleen Miller Measure is published six times a year for employees and associates of Hewlett-Packard Company. Produced by Corporate Public Relations, Employee Communications Department, Brad Whitworth, manager. Address carrespondence to Measure, Hewlett-Packard Company, 20BR, PO Box 10301, Palo Alto, California 94303-0890 USA (415) 857-4144. Report changes of address to your local personnel department. © Copyright 1991 by Hewlett-Packard Company. Material may be reprinted with permission. Member, International Association of Business Communicators. Hewlett-Packard Company is an international manufacturer of measurement and computation products and systems recognized for excellence in quality and support. The company's products and services are used in industry, business, engineering, science, medicine and education in approximately 100 countries. HP employs more than 92,000 people worldwide and had revenue of $13.2 billion in its 1990 fiscal year. On the cover: Red and black "bullseyes" show how light waves create interference pafferns. HP Labs' wayne Sorin uses fiber optics to demonstrate how "coherent interferometry" could be used to form the basis for tuture light-wave instruments. Photo byAndy Freeberg. 2 MEASURE www.HPARCHIVE.com HPLabs: By GordonBrown A funny thing happened on the way to the formation ofHP Laboratories in 1966. Instead ofreferring to it with plural nouns and verbs (Le., "they" and "are"), people began to use singular forms ("it" and "is"). While the gurus ofgrammar might disapprove, HP people did it anyway-because it made a lot ofsense. For one thing-particularly at thattime-ithelped to iden­ HP Labs researcher Alice tify the new corporate R&D Fischer-Colbrie uses a molecular-beam epitaxy entity in relation to the existing labs within the various divisions. machine to depositgallium It arsenide-atomic layer by was an important distinction: HP Labs was created to conduct atomic layer-to develop the long-range research needed to foster the product-oriented transistors, integrated circuits and optical devices. research ofthe divisions. Today, 25 years later, singular references to HP Labs make even more sense. Here's how Frank Carrubba, director ofHP Laboratories since 1987, views that position: "HP Labs has a very clear and central mission, one that emphasizes long-range tech­ nological exploration and advanced development in close col­ laboration with the product organizations. "In that sense, we have a mission similar to Star Trek's Enter- January-February 1991 3 www.HPARCHIVE.com HPLabs prise-in our case, to boldly seek out those new frontiers ofscience and knowledge that can then be applied in new and improved products. That con­ cept suggests a great deal ofteamwork, both inside HP Labs and with the prod­ uct labs, and that is what we strive for." The result is a process known to industry as "technology transfer." At HP, it's a true team effort, with the Labs and the divisions working closely together to bring the best ofsuccessful new tech­ nologies into action in the form ofnew or improved products and systems. Fortune magazine portrayed the transfer process in July 1990, saying, "If any company holds the key to technol­ ogy transfer, it is Carrubba's HP. The $12-billion-a-year maker ofcomputers and instruments maintains a stunningly Engineers at HP Labs helped develop the HP CareVue 9000 clinical information system, which is used in hospital intensive-care units. Sixty percent ot Labs' research results in HP products. high rate ofinnovation: More than 50 percent ofsales derive from products developed within the pastthree years." The article adds thatHP "estimates Satisfied customers that fully 60 percentofthe research Roland Haitz, R&D manager for the HP Labs also has had a long and conducted in its labs finds its way into Components Group, notes that one of fruitful working relationship with the product applications." the very early successes ofHP Labs Medical Group, adds Ben Holmes, That transfer rate adds up to a very was the development ofLEDs­ Groupv.P. and G.M. The most suc­ long and impressive list ofsuccessful light-emitting diodes-that are still cessfuljoint project produced an a major businessfor that group. entire new business area for HP­ Another, in which Roland was ultrasonic imaging. directly involved around 1975, was "Medical is one ofthe disciplines Newproducts based HP's first fiber-optic link. Itwas a where the next-bench syndrome on transfers ifrom collaborative effort among Labs doesn't work because none ofus are HPLabs) continue to researchers.After experimenting on practicing physicians," Ben says. itfor almost 18 months, they were "The conventional wisdom ofputting accountforthe bulk of joined by a division engineer to help physicians on staffisn't the right HPsales. conductfeasibility studies. The engi­ thing to do because then they stop neer took itback with him, and one practicing medicine and their experi­ year later it was unveiled-and ence is frozen in time. new products and technologies (see resulted in the formation ofthe "The close working relationship list on page 7). Optical CommunicationDivision. ofHP Labs and its outside medical The fact is that a great many HP divi­ "Neither ofthese were sure advisory board trulyresults in a con­ sions have been formed around HP things," Roland says. "Labs should be tinuing flow ofclinical ideas which Labs' contributions, and new products working on the edge-takingrisks­ getturned into products. That inter­ based on transfers continue to account providing there are reasonable argu­ change ofideas is a greatstrength for the bulk ofHP sales. ments for pursuing them." for us." One ofthe key factors in HPL's effec- 4 MEASURE www.HPARCHIVE.com Lab~ researchers (from left) Keith Moore, Greg Gibbons and Julie Wilker discuss a measurement and manufacturing systems lab project. tiveness is, as Frank explains it, "an The function ofthe hub, ofcourse, is During the pastyear, the 1,00o-person environmentthatfosters innovation and to supportthose spokes with advanced organization, which includes about creativity, and accepts 'intelligent fail­ research. That includes basic research 600 researchers, formalized the practice ure' as an integral part ofthe process." undertaken by HP Labs as well as explo­ ofinteraction among those units by add­ Given the success ofthe HP transfer rations and adaptations ofresearch ing a new frarnework-"strategic port­ process, why was Labs formed as late as emerging from university and industrial folios" and "programs." 1966 when the company was already on laboratories. Each offour portfolios supports a a 27-year roll? Co-founder Bill Hewlett There's a lot ofpressure on that cornmon business strategy: materials provided the answers three years ago: hub. Even while they're looking five to and microstructures, manufacturing, "In 1957-topreserve the intimacy measurement, computation. Programs we had er\ioyed as a smaller company­ are the means by which the portfolio we decided to form four divisions, each teams, each headed by a lab director, with its own R&D lab. However, after The BristolLabs was a now will undertake the rapid integration several years we found that division key contributorto the ofnew technologies into the product engineers were so concerned with day­ earlyHPNewWave divisions. They will do this with multi­ to-day problems that they didn't have disciplinary teams ofpeople with spec­ time to develop longer-range plans. We Iarchitecture... ialized skills from the various labs. realized thatthe only way to get that A new initiative which began in 1989 work done was to establish a central is the HPL Research Board. Its 18 distin­ research facility, and we asked Barney seven years down some new and unex­ guished members corne from universi­ Oliver to head it." plored road, Labs researchers have to ties, institutes and industries (five from Thatcharterstill holds. The original begin thinking in terms ofultimate HP) around the world. The board's facility has grown to include nine labs­ destinations. charter is to contribute technical fore­ six in Palo Alto, California, two in Bris­ The basic structure ofHP Labs isjust casts and vision related to HP's busi­ tol, England, and one in Tokyo, Japan. that-nine laboratories, each with a nesses; to help identify emerging Thgether, they function as a hub in a distinctive set ofdisciplines. Its annual technologies; and to consult in their complex wheel whose spokes connect budgetaverages close to 10 percent of application. directly with every HP organization. HP's total R&D spending. January-February 1991 5 www.HPARCHIVE.com HPLabs The international makeup ofthe board reflects a strong new emphasis by Labs on globalization. This actually got under way in 1984 with the establish­ ment ofHPL's first applied research lab outside the U.S., in Bristol, England. In seven years, the European Labs in Bristol has grown to more than 200 people, representing more than 10 nationalities. Stephen Gale and Colin Baker (on screen) can see and hear each other while The Bristol Labs was a key contribu­ they share data on this prototype system developed at HP Labs Bristol.