PC Magazine featured the UltraLite on its cover in November 1988[4] and shortly thereafter journalists began referring to any A4-sized computer as "notebooks", to distinguish them from the larger and heavier laptops of the time.

[5] The product was originally developed by an NEC Japan telecommunications engineering team that was trying to make an inexpensive lightweight terminal for programming PABX systems.

Tom Martin, the Vice President in charge of the group, asked, "Can you make this thing run MS-DOS"?

It was applauded by the media, who were dying to find a small lightweight computing platform that could be used for note-taking and article writing.

So although the UltraLite ushered in a new era in portable computing, its original design as a telecommunications maintenance terminal proved to be its commercial downfall.