It all began in a garage in 1961 when two airline pilots set out to invent an alternative to the conventional headsets of commercial aviation. The product Courtney Graham and Keith Larkin created in that tiny garage in Santa Cruz, California was more than just the world's first lightweight headset. It was the birth of a company called Plantronics, and the first of a half-century of breakthroughs in communications.
Plantronics was the first headset in outer space, when astronaut Wally Schirra chose to use the MS50 for the Mercury mission, adapting the lightweight model to fit inside his helmet.
Then we made history when Neil Armstrong walked on the moon and uttered the legendary words: "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind" through a Plantronics headset.
Back on earth, we invented the first call center headset in 1983. Known as the StarSet Supra, it became so popular that within two years it represented half of all Plantronics sales, becoming the headset of choice in call centers around the world.
By the '90s, our products were busy transforming the business environment as office workers everywhere adopted Plantronics ultra-lightweight, in-the-ear models. Cordless, hands-free designs followed, allowing business executives the freedom to roam from their phones. And by century's end, we were perfecting headsets for multimedia, gaming and Internet telephony.
Since 2000, Plantronics has simply created one revolution after another, in call clarity, noise reduction and ingenious ergonomics. In 2005, it was the Discovery 640. Its sleek design and amazingly clear audio helped Bluetooth headsets go mainstream. And the epitome of design and headset technology launched in 2009 with the award-winning Voyager PRO.
It all began in a garage, and continues now in laboratories and sound chambers, the commitment, some would say obsession, unchanged: to innovate relentlessly and perfect sound, not in the name of technology, but simply in the name of communication.