Name
|
Origin
|
Starbucks
|
Not
as abstract as many people think.
|
Kinkos
|
The
founder's nickname from school, because of his kinky red
hair.
|
Motorola
|
From
Motor and Victrola - as originally they made car radios.
|
Xerox
|
An
abbreviation of the word xerography - their underlying original
technology
|
eBay
|
Official
story now differs, but we still think it was from strong
East Bay connotations.
|
| Volkswagen |
Literally
"the people's car" - a term supposedly coined
by Adolf Hitler.
|
Nike
|
Round
about evolution from Phil Knight - the founder - as proposed
by one of his employees. The name was drawn out of a hat
full of other submissions. That particular employee apparently
awoke in middle of the night and said it had to be Nike
- Greek for Victory.
|
Hitachi
|
The
two characters used to write it mean "sun" + "stand." By
extension, it also could be translated "land of the rising
sun."
|
Nobel
Prize
|
The
famous peace and science prizes, named after Alfred E. Nobel
- who invented dynamite!
|
Google
|
A
variation on the mathematical term googol - a very, very,
very big number.
|
Yahoo
|
From
the dictionary, when founders were looking for names like
YACC (Yet Another C Compiler) - a very inside story for
Unix hackers.
|
BMW
|
Of
course they are initials. But in this case for words that
are almost unpronounceable in English - Bayerische Motoren
Werke.
|
Oracle
|
Code
name of their first big government project.
|
Snapple
|
One
of their original flavors: Spice N Apple.
|
| Chevrolet |
Ironically,
one of America's greatest car companies is named after a
man born in Switzerland, who only had a short association
with the car company and never lost his French accent.
|
| Tiffany
& Co. |
This
famous jewelry brand is not named after a lady, but rather
Charles Tiffany, one of the founders. It used to be called
Tiffany & Young.
|
