Nihon Keisanki, one of the sixty Japanese companies that made these things during their so-called "wars" in the 1970s, developed the world's first microprocessor.  
An early one of these devices from Sony known as the SOBAX was killed because Ibuka Masaru thought there was only a market for them amongst businessmen.  Nihon Keisanki, one of the sixty Japanese companies that made these things during their so-called "wars" in the 1970s, developed the world's first microprocessor.  Patrick Haggerty dreamed up a (*) palm-sized device of this type to sell the integrated circuits of his Dallas-based company.  The awesomely named Rocket Sasaki challenged his engineers at Sharp to make the first solar-powered one.  A man playing with one of these devices on a train inspired Gunpei Yokoi to develop the Game &amp; Watch.  Canon was the first to add a phone-style 10-digit pad to them.  For 10 points, the TI-83 is what type of device for making math easy?
An early one of these devices from Sony known as the SOBAX was killed because Ibuka Masaru thought there was only a market for them amongst businessmen.  
calculator [or graphing calculator