November 11, 2002, issue of Business Week:
  • 1989 - GRiD Systems unveils GRiDPAD, the first portable computer with a touch screen. Sales don't match hype. GRiD's head architect, Jeff Hawkins, later leaves to start handheld pioneer Palm Computing.
  • 1991 - GO Corp. debuts a pen-based tablet. AT&T acquires GO — and shuts it down by mid-1994.
  • 1992 - Apple unveils pocket-size Newton. Its iffy handwriting recognition becomes a plot line in Doonesbury. Apple pulls the plug in 1997.
  • 1992 - Gates launches Microsoft's Windows for Pen. Product stalls at the gate and is gone by 1994.
  • April 1996 - Palm ships its new handheld computer, the Palm Pilot. It's the first pen-based computer to succeed.
  • November 1997 - Oracle veteran Dick Brass joins Microsoft to work on tablet technology.
  • Spring 1999 - Brass gets the OK to pursue the tablet. He hires PC pioneers Butler Lampson and Chuck Thacker, as well as Bert Keely, an engineer who led a tablet project at Silicon Graphics. He persuades Alex Loeb, who was in the Office group, to run the tablet group.
  • November 2000 - Gates features the tablet in his speech at the Comdex technology trade show.
  • February-March 2001 - Microsoft sends 40 tablets to Minneapolis for a six-week field trial at three companies. Users pan a key feature that tries to predict if they're writing or navigating with the pen.
  • May 2001 - After heated debates, Loeb pulls the technology from the tablet. Some angry developers threaten to quit the tablet team. Even Gates is disappointed.
  • August 2001 - Loeb worries that Gates's support for a 2002 launch is wavering. At a meeting, Gates pushes for handwriting features in Microsoft Office at the launch. That done, he green-lights the project for 2002 launch.
  • November 2001 - First prototype tablets emerge. Acer builds a laptop with a swivel screen that flips over into a writing pad. Gates features them in his Comdex speech.
  • May 2002 - Gates takes 150 tablets to Microsoft's annual CEO Summit. Loeb frets that the devices aren't ready, but they work.
  • August 2002 - Tablet software is released to computer makers. The team parties, rocking to Keely's band.
  • November 2002 - Tablet launches, with seven PC makers unveiling new products (Greene, 2002).