List of Company Name Etymologies - M

M

• Maggi – food company named after its founder, Julius Maggi. It was taken over by Nestlé in 1947 and survives as a brand name.
• Malév - Hungary's national airline carrier. Its name comes from Magyar Légiközlekedési Vállalat - meaning Hungarian Air-traffic Company.
• MAN – abbreviation for Maschinenfabrik Augsburg-Nürnberg (Augsburg-Nuremberg Machine Company). The MAN company is a German engineering works and truck manufacturer.
• Mandriva – new company formed from the merger of Mandrake Linux and Connectiva Linux
• Manhattan Associates – named from Manhattan Beach, California, where the company was founded, before it moved to Atlanta, Georgia.
• Manugistics – Manufacturing + Logistics, a supplier of supply chain optimization software.
• Manulife Financial – founded in 1887 as Manufacturing Life Insurance Company
• Mars – named after Frank C. Mars and his wife, Ethel, who started making candy in 1911. Their son, Forrest E. Mars, joined with Bruce Murrie, the son of a Hershey executive, to form M&M Ltd (from Mars & Murrie). Forrest took over the family business after his father's death and merged the two companies in 1964. After retiring from Mars, Inc. in 1993, Forrest founded Ethel M. Chocolates, named after his mother.
• Masco Corporation – from the names of the founder Alex Manoogian, Screw and Company. Masco Screw Products Co. was founded in 1929.
• Mast-Jägermeister AG – Named for founder Wilhelm Mast and its main product, Jägermeister (German for "hunt master") liqueur.
• Mattel – a portmanteau of the founders names Harold "Matt" Matson and Elliot Handler.
• Maybach-Motorenbau GmbH – It was founded in 1909 by Wilhelm Maybach with his son Karl Maybach.
• Mazda Motor Corporation – the company was founded as Toyo Kogyo, started manufacturing Mazda brand cars in 1931, and changed its name to Mazda in 1984. The cars were supposedly named after Ahura Mazda, the chief deity of the Zoroastrians, though many think this explanation was created after the fact, to cover up what is simply a poor anglicized version of the founders name, Jujiro Matsuda.
• MBNA – originally a subsidiary of Maryland National Corporation, MBNA once stood for Maryland Bank, NA (NA itself standing for National Association, a federal designation representing the bank's charter).
• McDonald's – from the name of the brothers Dick McDonald and Mac McDonald, who founded the first McDonald's restaurant in 1940.
• MCI Communications – Microwave Communications, Inc. The company later merged with Worldcom to create MCI Worldcom. The MCI was dropped in 2000 and the acquiring company changed its name to MCI when it emerged from bankruptcy in 2003.
• Mercedes – from the first name of the daughter of Emil Jellinek, who distributed cars of the early Daimler company around 1900.
• Merillat Industries – named after Orville D. Merillat, who founded the company in 1946.
• Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) – Film studio formed from the merger of three other companies: Metro Picture Corporation, Goldwyn Pictures Corporation, and Louis B. Mayer Pictures. Goldwyn Picture Corporation in turn was named after the last names of Samuel Goldfish, and Edgar and Archibald Selwyn.
• MFI – from Mullard Furniture Industries. The original company was named after the founder's wife, whose maiden name was Mullard.
• MG Cars – from Morris Garages after co-founder William Morris. Under Chinese ownership, the company says: "We want Chinese consumers to know this brand as 'Modern Gentleman'."
• Microlins – from Microcomputers and Lins, a Brazilian city where the company was founded by José Carlos Semenzato
• Micron Technology – computer memory producer named after the microscopic parts of its products. It is now better known by its consumer brand name: Crucial.
• Microsoft – coined by Bill Gates to represent the company that was devoted to microcomputer software. Originally christened Micro-Soft, the '-' disappeared on 3/2/1987 with the introduction of a new corporate identity and logo. The "slash between the 'o' and 's' emphasizes the "soft" part of the name and conveys motion and speed."
• Midway Games – derived from the name of an airport on the southwestern part of Chicago.
• Mincom Limited – Mincom was founded in Brisbane, Australia in 1979. Currently the largest software company in Australia and the fourth oldest ERP company globally. The company initially created software to specifically assist mining companies and the name Mining 'computing.
• Minolta – Minolta was founded in Osaka, Japan in 1928 as Nichi-Doku Shashinki Shōten (日独写真機商店; literally: Japan-Germany camera shop). It was not until 1934 that the name Minolta first appeared on a camera, the Minolta Vest. The name was given by founder Kazuo Tajima due to its similarity to the Japanese term "minoru ta" {稔る田} meaning "growing rice fields," which came from an ancient Japanese proverb that was a favorite of Tajima's mother meaning "the ripest ears of rice bow their heads lowest," and a desire from Tajima to run an innovative, yet humble business.
• MIPRO – stands for MIcrophone PROfessionals. MIPRO is a manufacturer of wireless microphones.
• MIPS – originally stood for Microprocessor without Interlocking Pipeline Stages. When interlocks where added to a later implementation, the name was redefined to not be an acronym but just a name. (The name also connotes computer speed, by association with the acronym for millions of instructions per second.)
• MITIE – an acronym for Managamenet Incentive Through Investment Equity
• Mitel – from Mike and Terry's Lawnmowers, after the founders Michael Cowpland (see also: Corel) and Terry Matthews, and the company's original business plan.
• MITRE – Massachusetts Institute of Technology Research Establishment. (however The MITRE Corporation asserts that its name is not an acronym)
• Mitsubishi – the name Mitsubishi (三菱) has two parts: mitsu means three and hishi (changing to bishi in the middle of the word) means diamond (the shape). Hence, the three diamond logo. (Note that "diamond" in this context refers only to the rhombus shape, not to the precious gem.)
• Moneris Solutions – Latin for "You (plural) are being protected."
• Morningstar, Inc. – The name Morningstar is taken from the last sentence in Walden, a book by Henry David Thoreau; "the sun is but a morning star"
• Motorola – Founder Paul Galvin came up with this name when his company (at the time, Galvin Manufacturing Company) started manufacturing radios for cars. Many audio equipment makers of the era used the "ola" ending for their products, most famously the "Victrola" phonograph made by the Victor Talking Machine Company. The name was meant to convey the idea of "sound" and "motion". It became so widely recognized that the company later adopted it as the company name.
• Mozilla Foundation – from the name of the web browser that preceded Netscape Navigator. When Marc Andreesen, co-founder of Netscape, created a browser to replace the Mosaic browser, it was internally named Mozilla (Mosaic-Killer, Godzilla) by Jamie Zawinski.
• Mozy - from the words "More Zetabytes for Your Mom". It was initially named "Breakaway Data Services for Your Mom," or "Bdsym".
• MRF – from Madras Rubber Factory, founded by K M Mammen Mappillai in 1946. He started with a toy-balloon manufacturing unit at Tiruvottiyur, Chennai (then called Madras). In 1952 he began manufacturing tread-rubber and, in 1961, tyres.
• Musco Lighting – from the company's original location of Muscatine County, Iowa, where it still operates a large manufacturing facility.
• Mustek – Taiwanese electronics manufacturer with name derived from Most Unique Scanner Technology.
• MVC – from Music and Video Club, the name of a UK-based entertainment chain.