Where Apple, Google and Other Names Come From

What’s in a corporate name? Despite all the professional corporate identity folks (ourselves included) who engage in the scientific development of corporate names, many of the most famous ones were developed by the companies’ founders – based on life experiences, favorite foods, , city names, last names, inside jokes and so on. Here are a few examples from the MakeUseOf.com blog:

Apple Computers
Steve Jobs was three months late in filing a name for the business, and he threatened to call his company Apple Computers — after his favorite fruit — if his colleagues couldn’t suggest a better name by 5:00 pm.

Cisco
It is not an acronym as popularly believed; Cisco is short for San Francisco.

Motorola
At a time when “Victrola” was a dominant force in audio, founder Paul Galvin came up with Motorola because his company specialized in crafting superior radios for cars. Intel
Bob Noyce and Gordon Moore wanted to name their new company ”Moore Noyce” — but, unfortunately, that name was already trademarked by a hotel chain — so they had to settle for an acronym of INTegrated Electronics.

Google
The name started as a joke boasting about the amount of information the search-engine would be able to search. Originally called ”Googol” (the number represented by 1 followed by 100 zeros), the company’s name was changed slightly after its founders –Sergey Brin and Larry Page — received their first check from an angel investor … made out to ”Google.”


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