Masahiro Hara and Denso engineers built the QR code in 1994 to help Toyota suppliers scan car parts from any angle, then kept the patent open until phone cameras and a 2020 pandemic turned the factory square into a daily ritual on restaurant tables (opens in new tab)

Masahiro Hara was trying to make a factory scanner read faster when his team at Denso built the QR code in 1994, a black-and-white square that could hold far more information than a barcode and still be read when it was dirty, tilted, or partly damaged. The problem sounded small because it belonged to an […]