Philco

Philco (an acronym for Philadelphia Battery Company) is an American electronics manufacturer headquartered in Philadelphia. Philco was a pioneer in battery, radio, and television production. The company was purchased by Ford in 1961, and renamed "Philco-Ford" in 1966. Ford sold the company to GTE in 1974, which sold it to Norelco in 1981, that became a subsidiary of the Dutch company Philips in 1987. In North America, the Philco brand is owned by Philips. In other markets, the Philco International brand is owned by Electrolux. In the early 1920s, Philco made storage batteries, "socket power" battery eliminator units (plug-in transformers), and battery chargers. With the invention of the rectifier tube, which made it practical to power radios by electrical outlets, in 1928, Philco entered the radio business. They followed other radio makers such as RCA, Atwater-Kent, Zenith Electronics, Freshman Masterpiece, FADA Radio (Frank A. D'Andrea Radio), and AH Grebe into the battery-powered radio business. By the end of 1930, they were selling more radios than any other maker, a position they held for more than 20 years. Philco built many iconic radios and television sets, including the classic cathedral-shaped wooden radio of the 1930s (aka the "Baby Grand"), and the Predicta series of television receiver sets of the 1950s. Philo Farnsworth, credited for inventing the first fully functional all electronic television system (U.S. patent 1,773,980, filed Jan 7, 1927), worked at Philco from 1931 to 1933.