In the old days, it was exceptional for a tech stock to pay a dividend. That's because many companies in the sector weren't profitable in their early stages, and needed to save coin to maintain their businesses. The ones that became successful often stuck to that policy, choosing to prioritize activities like research and development. The hope was that investors would be satisfied simply with a rising stock price.

That's no longer the norm as the top tech companies on the scene are well-established, habitually profit-making, and frequently able to generate big piles of cash. Two incumbents that have declared dividend increases based on this solid foundation are International Business Machines (NYSE: IBM) and Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM). Let's take a brief look at both.

IBM was a tech company before tech companies existed to any meaningful degree. Its origins stretch back to 1911 as a business selling recordkeeping and tabulation equipment for corporate clients. Very soon after that, it began paying a regular quarterly dividend, and it hasn't let up since.

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Source Fool.com