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Here are some tidbits about some of the most famous companies around the world, on how come they got started and how they got their name etc. AltaVista means high view in Spanish.

Fanta was made by Max Keith in Germany as a replacement for the American Coca Cola during the world war II. It was given to the Nazi Soldiers.
LEGO, is taken from the danish words leg godt which means play well. Or the Latin word which means play together but the Danish company say that is just a coincidence. Pepsi is derived from the word, dyspepsia. Microsoft, Bill Gates wanted to call it Micro Software but then went with Micr0-Soft, the - was later removed. Starbucks is named after a character in the novel, Moby-Dick. Skype - The original prototype of the companys flagship product had the name SkyPeer-to-Peer, which was shrunk down to Skyper, then finally Skype. Pixar, the action verb of making pixels in Spanish..
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Digg Kevin Roses friend David Prager originally wanted to call the site Diggnation, but Kevin wanted a simpler name. He chose the name Digg, because users are able to dig stories, out of those submitted, up to the front page. The site was called Digg instead of Dig because the domain name dig.com was previously registered, by Walt Disney Internet Group.
Twitter The name twitter was derived from the original idea Twitch, which didnt bring up the right imagery. Intel A combination of INTegrated Electronics Xerox The Greek root xer means dry. The inventor, Chestor Carlson, named his product Xerox as it was dry copying, markedly different from the then prevailing wet copying.

SAP Systems, Applications, Products in Data Processing, formed by four ex-IBM employees who used to work in the Systems/Applications/Projects group of IBM
Compaq They took the first three letters from computer and added the paq to denote a small integral object, or it could also mean compatibility and quality. Toyota from the name of the founder, Sakichi Toyoda. Initially called Toyeda, it was changed after a contest for a better-sounding name. The new name was written in katakana with eight strokes, a number that is considered lucky in Japan.

Acer Born as Multitech International in 1976, the company changed its name to Acer in 1987. The Latin word for sharp, acute, able and facile
Apache according to the projects 1997 FAQ: The Apache group was formed around a number of people who provided patch files that had been written for NCSA httpd 1.3. The result after combining them was A PAtCHy server Cisco short for San Francisco. Facebook name stems from the colloquial name of books given to newly enrolled students at the start of the academic year by university administrations in the US with the intention of helping students to get to know each other better. FedEx abbreviation of Federal Express Corporation, the companys original name Fuji named after Mount Fuji, the highest mountain in Japan. HMV from His Masters Voice, which appeared in 1899 as the title of a painting of Nipper, a Jack Russell terrier, listening to a gramophone. Nike named for the Greek goddess of victory.
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AT&T the American Telephone and Telegraph Corporation officially changed its name to AT&T in the 1990s.
Colgate-Palmolive formed from a merger of soap manufacturers Colgate & Company and Palmolive-Peet. Peet was dropped in 1953. Colgate was named after William Colgate, an English immigrant, who set up a starch, soap and candle business in New York Glaxo a dried-milk company set up in Bunnythorpe, New Zealand, by Joseph Edward Nathan. The company wanted to use the name "Lacto" but it was similar to some already in use. Glaxo evolved and was registered on 27 October 1906. GlaxoSmithKline was a 2000 merger of Glaxo Wellcome and SmithKline Beecham. Kodak Both the Kodak camera and the name were the invention of founder George Eastman. The letter "K" was a favorite with Eastman; he felt it a strong and incisive letter. He tried out various combinations of words starting and ending with "K". He saw three advantages in the name. It had the merits of a trademark word, would not be mispronounced and the name did not resemble anything in the art. There is a misconception that the name was chosen because of its similarity to the sound produced by the shutter of the camera Samsung meaning three stars in Korean.

Infosys Indian software major. Information Systems LG from the combination of two popular Korean brands, Lucky and Goldstar. Lotus Software Mitch Kapor named his company after the Lotus Position or Padmasana. Kapor used to be a teacher of Transcendental Meditation technique as taught by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.

McDonalds from the name of the brothers Dick McDonald and Mac McDonald, who founded the first McDonalds restaurant in 1940.
Samsung meaning three stars in Korean.

Wipro from Western India Palm Refined Oil Ltd Wipro Technologies. The company started as a modest Vanaspati and laundry soap producer and is now also an IT services giant.
Sun Microsystems its founders designed their first workstation in their dorm at Stanford University, and chose the name Stanford University Network for their product, hoping to sell it to the college. They did not.
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