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Gateway was founded on September 5, 1985 on a farm outside Sioux City, Iowa, by brothers Ted and Norman Waitt, and friend Mike Hammond. Originally called Gateway 2000, it was one of the first successful direct sales PC companies, utilizing a sales model copied from Dell. Now Gateway, Incorporated is a computer hardware company based in Irvine, California, and North Sioux City, South Dakota which develops, manufactures, supports, and markets personal computers, computer monitors, servers, and computer accessories.
Gateway became a well-known brand in 1991 when it started shipping its computer hardware in cow-spotted boxes in conjunction with creative advertising. During the mid-2000s, the company struggled dropping from the Fortune 500 list of largest companies worldwide in 2006. On October 16, 2007 Acer Inc. completed an acquisition of Gateway for approximately US $710 million.