The Women in Tech Show
Scaling Compaq with Karen Walker
In the 80s, Compaq became one of the fastest growing companies in American History. Compaq pioneered the idea of building a computer that was compatible with IBM’s software. Back then, IBM was the dominant player in the personal computers space and their software was used everywhere. Karen Walker was Vice President of Operations at Compaq. She controlled capital investments totaling $1 Billion. Karen oversaw the construction of 11 million square feet of Compaq’s offices around the world and helped grow Compaq, which became the largest supplier of PCs in the 90s.