Although we generally associate technological advancements with the companies that successfully commercialize them, there are often underappreciated bodies toiling away behind the curtain. In many cases over the last 40 years, PARC (formerly Xerox Palo Alto Research Center) has been that hidden player, inventing many of today"s ubiquitous technologies or refining them from abstract concepts.
Launched as a development arm of Xerox Corporation in 1970, PARC has played an instrumental role in the engineering of laser printing and many of the technologies that compose the PC you"re reading this on. The team included many of the world"s top computer scientists, not least of which were former employees of the Stanford Research Institute.
Despite its vast industry contributions, the group has been criticized for failing to capitalize on its many innovations. While some of our older readers might be familiar with the prolific Palo Alto Research Center, we think its accomplishments have largely escaped the younger tech crowd. We"d like to take a few minutes to give credit where credit"s due.
Read: Xerox PARC: A Brief Nod to the Minds Behind Laser Printing, Ethernet, the GUI and More
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