From Apple to Amazon to Microsoft to Twitter, the names of some of the world's most popular tech companies tend to have interesting and significant backstories.
1. Adobe
With products like Photoshop and Illustrator, Adobe has been an important and influential player in tech for as long as most can remember. The story surrounding the Adobe name is actually quite charming. The company was named after "Adobe Creek," a small body of water that ran behind the home of Adobe co-founder John Warnock.
2. BlackBerry
In 2001, Research In Motion asked a consulting company to come up with a name for its new email messaging device. The consulting company noted that the keys on the device resembled the outer flesh of certain kinds of fruit, including the blackberry. And hence, the name was chosen.
3. Apple
The Apple name was drummed up by none other than company co-founder Steve Jobs. According to Steve Wozniak, Jobs came up with the name after visiting an Oregon commune which housed an apple orchard.
4. Oracle
You'd be hard pressed to find a cooler story behind a company name than Oracle's. Founded by Larry Ellison, Bob Miner, and Ed Oates, the Oracle name comes from a database project (named "Oracle") the trio had worked on for the CIA as contractors. Interestingly, Ellison has said that Oracle's very first customer was, surprise, surprise, the CIA.
5. Twitter
According to Twitter founder Jack Dorsey, the company wanted a name that was reminiscent of what using the service was like. "When you received a tweet," Dorsey explained a few years back, "your phone would buzz. It would jitter.