Tally was a leading American manufacturer of printers. Founded in 1949 in Kent, Washington,

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

by Philip Renshaw, the company was a leading manufacturer of punch tape readers. In 1970 Tally developed line matrix printer technologies and became a leader in the printer industry. In 1972 Mannesmann Präzisiontechnik was founded as a subsidiary of

Mannesmann AG Mannesmann was a German industrial conglomerate. It was originally established as a manufacturer of steel pipes in 1890 under the name "Deutsch-Österreichische Mannesmannröhren-Werke AG". (Loosely translated: "German-Austrian Mannesmann pi ...

, specialising in dot matrix printers. In 1979 Tally and Mannesmann Präzisiontechnik were merged to form Mannesmann Tally, part of the Mannesmann Kienzle computer group. Mannesmann Tally offered printing solutions in all major technologies into all key markets, along with service and support. Printers providing APL characters were produced in cooperation with I. P. Sharp Associates in order to support their international timesharing network. The flexible, though challenging, method of pin-firing allowed the full APL set of characters to be printed as well as an enhanced set of more universal (worldwide) glyphs. James C. Field created the dot-matrix images with the help of a software trick invented by L. M. Breed (q.v). In 1996 Tally was reformed as part of a management buy out from Mannesmann, backed by

Legal & General Legal & General Group plc, commonly known as Legal & General, is a British multinational financial services and asset management company headquartered in London, England. Its products and services include investment management, lifetime mortg ...

Ventures. World headquarters was in

Elchingen Elchingen is a municipality about 7 km east of Ulm–Neu-Ulm in the district of Neu-Ulm in Bavaria, Germany. Municipality parts: * Thalfingen: 4 211 residents, 8.83 km² * Oberelchingen: 3 024 residents, 7.31 km² * ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

with subsidiaries and business partners in more than 130 countries. Production continued in Elchingen for serial dot matrix and professional inkjet printers, and in Kent for line printers and color development. In 2003, Tally merged with

GENICOM GENICOM was an American manufacturer of computer printers, based in Chantilly, Virginia. The company operated from 1982 to 2003. The GE years In 1954, General Electric (GE) decided to decentralize the company into separate business units. After re ...

to form

TallyGenicom The TallyGenicom brand, acquired by Printronix in 2009, includes laser and line matrix printers, parts, consumables and service. Printronix now owns the intellectual property and worldwide sales distribution rights for TallyGenicom line matrix and ...

. In 2009, the TallyGenicom brand was acquired by

Printronix Printronix is an American supplier of line matrix printers. Printronix is based in Irvine, California, and operates across 14 offices worldwide. Products Printronix's printers are primarily used in industrial environments for printing high-volum ...

. The intellectual property and worldwide distribution rights for the TallyGenicom serial matrix, inkjet and thermal technologies were retained by TallyGenicom AG and acquired by DASCOM in June 2009. DASCOM Europe now market the full range of the former TallyGenicom brand of serial, passbook and mobile printers under the ‘Tally' brand name.

References

Printronix and TallyGenicom AG Reach Final Agreement in Europe and Worldwide
originally published on reuters.com, May 11, 2009
DASCOM Expands its Global Reach by Acquiring TallyGenicom Key Assets
originally published in IT Director, June 17, 2009 {{authority control American companies established in 1949 American companies disestablished in 2003 Companies based in Kent, Washington Computer companies established in 1949 Computer companies disestablished in 2003 Computer printer companies Defunct computer companies of the United States