Fender Musical Instruments Corporation (FMIC), commonly referred to simply as Fender, is an American manufacturer of stringed instruments and amplifiers, such as solid-body electric guitars, including the Stratocaster and the Telecaster. It is headquartered in Scottsdale, Arizona. The company, previously named the Fender Electric Instrument Manufacturing Company, was founded in Fullerton, California, by Clarence Leonidas "Leo" Fender in 1946. Leo Fender also designed one of the first commercially successful solid-body electric basses, the Precision Bass (P-Bass), which has become known in rock, jazz, country, Motown, funk, and other types of music. Fender's Precision and Jazz Bass models are now widely considered to be the standard to which most other electric bass guitars are measured.
The company is a privately held corporation, with the controlling majority of its stock owned by a group of its own company officers and managers. Larry Thomas is Chief Executive Officer and James Broenen is Chief Financial Officer.
The company filed for an Initial public offering in March 2012.
In addition to its Scottsdale headquarters, Fender has manufacturing facilities in Corona, California (US) and Ensenada, Baja California (Mexico).
Read more about Fender Musical Instruments Corporation: History, Instruments
Famous quotes containing the words musical, instruments and/or corporation:
“I think no woman I have had ever gave me so sweet a moment, or at so light a price, as the moment I owe to a newly heard musical phrase.”
—Stendhal [Marie Henri Beyle] (1783–1842)
“Fashionable women regard themselves, and are regarded by men, as pretty toys or as mere instruments of pleasure; and the vacuity of mind, the heartlessness, the frivolity which is the necessary result of this false and debasing estimate of women, can only be fully understood by those who have mingled in the folly and wickedness of fashionable life ...”
—Sarah M. Grimke (1792–1873)
“What I am anxious to do is to get the best bill possible with the least amount of friction.... I wish to avoid [splitting our party]. I shall do all in my power to retain the corporation tax as it is now and also force a reduction of the [tariff] schedules. It is only when all other efforts fail that I’ll resort to headlines and force the people into this fight.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)