Offering a thoroughly original view of the subject, Katz tells how design helped transform Silicon Valley into the most powerful engine of innovation in the world. From Hewlett-Packard and Ampex in the 1950s to Google and Facebook today, design has provided the bridge between research and development, art and engineering, technical performance and human behavior. Katz traces the origins of all of the leading consultancies¿including IDEO, frog, and Lunar¿and shows the process by which some of the world's most influential companies came to place design at the center of their business strategies. At the same time, universities, foundations, and even governments have learned to apply "design thinking¿ to their missions. Drawing on unprecedented access to a vast array of primary sources and interviews with nearly every influential design leader¿including Douglas Engelbart, Steve Jobs, and Don Norman¿Katz reveals design to be the missing link in Silicon Valley's ecosystem of innovation.