The patent for this "Display Keyboard" expired in 2016. However, the first programmable LCD keyboard was developed in the mid-1980s in Germany. This keyboard, sold under the LCBoard name in the U.S. until 1999, contained many of the features of the Optimus keyboard including monochrome graphic icons on each keyboard key, macro programming, context sensitive and application dependent switching between functions. S. Bigbie et. al. published related ideas in an IBM Technical Disclosure Bulletin (Vol. 21 No. 2 July 1978) , as did Alan Bagley of Hewlett-Packard in ().