History
MES represented the pinnacle of GEC's defence businesses which had a heritage of almost 100 years. Following GEC's acquisition of Marconi as part of English Electric in 1968 the Marconi brand was used for its defence businesses e.g. Marconi Space & Defence Systems (MSDS), Marconi Underwater Systems Ltd (MUSL). GEC's history of military products dates back to World War I with its contribution to the war effort then including radios and bulbs. World War II consolidated this position with the company involved in many important technological advances, most notably radar.
Between 1945 and GEC's demerger of its defence business in 1999, the company became one of the world's most important defence contractors. GEC's major defence related acquisitions included Associated Electrical Industries in 1967, English Electric Company (including its Marconi subsidiary) in 1968, Yarrow Shipbuilders in 1985, parts of Ferranti's defence business in 1990, Vickers Shipbuilding and Engineering in 1995 and Kvaerner Govan in 1999. In June 1998, MES acquired Tracor, a major American defence contractor, for $1.4bn.
Read more about this topic: Marconi Electronic Systems
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“It gives me the greatest pleasure to say, as I do from the bottom of my heart, that never in the history of the country, in any crisis and under any conditions, have our Jewish fellow citizens failed to live up to the highest standards of citizenship and patriotism.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)
“No matter how vital experience might be while you lived it, no sooner was it ended and dead than it became as lifeless as the piles of dry dust in a school history book.”
—Ellen Glasgow (1874–1945)
“False history gets made all day, any day,
the truth of the new is never on the news
False history gets written every day
...
the lesbian archaeologist watches herself
sifting her own life out from the shards she’s piecing,
asking the clay all questions but her own.”
—Adrienne Rich (b. 1929)