Notable for increasing Hewlett-Packard's revenue by nearly two hundred percent during his time with the computer company, Platt replaced John A. Young as C.E.O. and David Packard as Chairman of the Board in the early 1990s.
After earning an undergraduate mechanical engineering degree from Cornell University, he received his master's degree from the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Business.
In the early 2000s, he briefly headed Kendall-Jackson Wine Estates and also held a high-ranking position with the Boeing company.
With his first wife, Susan, he had daughters named Caryn and Laura; following his wife's death of cancer in 1981, he was a single parent to his young children. He and his second wife, Joan, raised two more daughters: Amanda and Hillary.
President Bill Clinton made Platt chairman of the Advisory Committee on Trade Policy Negotiations' World Trade Organization Task Force.
