This seems to be a summary of the story at http://www.hp9825.com/html/the_9100_project.html, written by people who do know what a Q-meter is, have heard of Olivetti, and cite their sources.
I see no overlap between the stories, even if they are about the same people.
On the same site, there is
http://www.hp9825.com/html/osborne-s_story.html
with what Tom Osborne says about the history of HP-35. That gives additional details, but it is also distinct from the parent article.
Short summary: "I want that in my pocket"
The several paragraphs in the parent article corresponding to specifically that web page start at:
> Tom Osborne, a Berkeley-trained electrical engineer, wasn’t one of those 9000 employees. In his Bay-area apartment, he had built a floating-point electronic calculator he called the Green Machine (after the color of the automotive touch-up paint he used on the balsa wood case). He tried shopping it around but no one was interested until he showed it to HP in June, 1965.