The creation and origins of company names – so central to their brand and image – springs up quite a few surprises. Some company names, that we now take for granted, come from interesting sources of inspiration. Others are just plain safe and dull. So let’s run through an alphabet of company names.
We start, as usual, with A is for… Apple.
Apple - As everyone knows the Apple Macintosh is named after the American variety of apple called the McIntosh and was chosen in part because Steve Jobs had worked on an Apple Farm one summer. It is also suggested that Jobs was a great fan of The Beatles’ record label Apple. A further theory, (truth unknown) is that the Apple logo with the bite taken out was a homage to Alan Turing.
Alan Turing is considered the father of modern computer science. He worked at Bletchley Park during World War II as a code-breaker and helped cracked the Enigma machine. He was also a homosexual who, when outed, it is rumoured, committed suicide by eating from a cyanide laced apple.
Alfa Romeo - the company was originally known as ALFA, an acronym for Anonima Lombarda Fabbrica Automobili. When Nicola Romeo bought ALFA in 1915, his surname was added to make the brand name we know now.
Adidas - the German sports-good company takes its name from its founder Adolf Dassler or ‘Adi’ Dassler, as he was known.
Adobe - it is said that the U.S. software company was named after the little creek that ran past the homes of founders John Warnock and Chuck Geschke.
Aldi - the German discounter store (see Chris’s blog ‘Flight to Value’) is also named after its founders. It takes the first two letters of the family name ‘Albrecht’ and the first two letters of the word ‘discount’. Cunning huh?
Asda - the British Supermarket chain comes from an abbreviation of Associated Dairies.
Asus - the company takes its name from, Pegasus, the winged horse of Greek mythology. The first three letters of the name were dropped to place the company name in a higher position in the alphabet. Perhaps we should change our name to Eechwood.
Aston Martin - the British car company’s name comes from the founder Lionel Martin and the Aston Hill races near Birmingham, UK where the company was first founded.
Atari - this word comes from the language of the Japanese board game ‘Go’. ‘Atari’ is when all of an opponent’s stones are threatened with capture - a bit like ‘check’ in chess, apparently.
Audi - the car manufacturer was founded by Lionel Horch in 1909. He took the name from the Latin translation of horch (hark in English). Audi is the imperative form of audire - to hear.
A&M records - was named after its founders Herb Alpert and Jerry Moss. Incidentally Moss, also a very successful horse breeder, named one of his horses Zenyatta after The Police’s third album Zenyatta Mondatta.
Amstrad - the British electronics company is a contraction of Alan Michael Sugar Trading. We’re sorry Alan but when it comes to originality in name creation ‘You’re fired!’
