Mighty Motorola, Mighty Manufacturer

Motorola; an American company with many "firsts" in science and technology history. Motorola, which was founded back in nineteen twenty eight in Chicago, IL was known, back then, as Galvin Manufacturing Corp. and its first product was a battery eliminator.

In 1930, when the company had started making car radios, the name was changed. It was changed to Motorola, the name was a made up by two men, Paul Galvin and Joseph Galvin. Paul and Joseph were the founders and came up with the Motorola name by combining the word "Motor" and a type of early phonograph called "Victrola".

Indeed, many of the early products were radio related products, from the battery eliminator to the first walkie talkies (in 1940). The company went public (1942) and by the 50's its main business was manufacturing and selling radios and TV's. It opened its first international subsidiary in 1952 in Toronto. A research and development laboratory in 1955 in Phoenix, Arizona. And in 1958 began work with NASA to supply radio equipment. 1960 was the introduction to the 19-inch cordless TV and in 63' the first ever rectangular color TV which quickly became an industry standard.

However, in nineteen seventy four, the company sold its quite profitable TV business, and simply left this portion of the consumer electronics market. But nearly a decade later, the company made history, yet again, by becoming the first to gain an FCC approval for a commercial cellphone device. In 1986, they made another contribution, inventing the Sigma Six quality improvement process which became a global standard in manufacturing and quality assurance. Around this time the company became a leader in semiconductor technology, supplying the central processing units (also known as CPU's) for many of the top-selling computer and videogame console brands of the day; its microprocessors were found in various machines. They also manufactured communications products, products like satellite and digital cable systems hardware.

The world's first working digital cell phone system was demonstrated using GSM in 1991. They followed that up with the world's first commercial digital radio system in 94' which combined paging, data, and voice dispatching in a single radio handset and network. A year later the company introduced the first ever pager which was two-way, this allowed receiving text and e-mail to follow with a form response. The year 2000 found the company in partnership with another organization to supply the world's first commercial GPRS cellular network, with the first GPRS cellphone developed by them.

Author:

Paul Wise has done extensive research on Motorola. Visit http://www.mbhwireless.com if you are in need of a Motorola Cell Phone, Bluetooth Device or any Motorola Accessories.