GOAL

At one point, Doug developed three separate futuristic projects simultaneously at Apple. This involved the first evolutions of what later became the iPad and iPhone.

 Using Workspace, Patton Design developed a range of tablet concepts that drew upon studies about the interactions of micro and macro devices in a communicative process.  Much later, Doug developed the first tablets with a memory stylus that contained what he called Personality Modules.

Patton Design produced the prototype of a small phone/tablet concept developed in partnership with The Wall Street Journal. This device, the PAD,  appeared on the main page of the paper. Later, Jim Scully, the CEO of Apple at the time, revised this acronym for the product’s entry into the market, calling it a PDA.

SUCCESS

The genesis of future Apple products was made possible by the aforementioned productions and Patton Design’s imaginative studies. They were based on Doug’s intense scrutiny of the idealized human experience as well as on technology reviews that helped Patton Design understand what was pragmatically correct for envisioning the future. Blending and harmonizing these two aspects of invention is always challenging, but the effort always reveals exciting real-time visions of where to aim for large corporations. Doing so leads technologists regarding what should be developed within the context of classical human needs.

 After these projects were conceptualized, Patton Design left Apple. This was around the time Steve Jobs was fired by the board—a fitting coincidence since Steve and Doug grew up on the same street in Los Altos. Doug then committed Patton Design to Microsoft/IHS Interactive Home Systems, creating home electronics for Bill Gates’ household.