Mazda was a

trademark A trademark (also written trade mark or trade-mark) is a type of intellectual property consisting of a recognizable sign, design, or expression that identifies products or services from a particular source and distinguishes them from ot ...

ed name registered by

General Electric General Electric Company (GE) is an American multinational conglomerate founded in 1892, and incorporated in New York state and headquartered in Boston. The company operated in sectors including healthcare, aviation, power, renewable ene ...

(GE) in 1909 for

incandescent light bulb An incandescent light bulb, incandescent lamp or incandescent light globe is an electric light with a wire filament heated until it glows. The filament is enclosed in a glass bulb with a vacuum or inert gas to protect the filament from oxi ...

s. The name was used from 1909 to 1945 in the United States by GE and Westinghouse. Mazda brand light bulbs were made for decades after 1945 outside the US. The company chose the name due to its association with

Ahura Mazda Ahura Mazda (; ae, , translit=Ahura Mazdā; ), also known as Oromasdes, Ohrmazd, Ahuramazda, Hoormazd, Hormazd, Hormaz and Hurmuz, is the creator deity in Zoroastrianism. He is the first and most frequently invoked spirit in the ''Yasna'' ...

, the transcendental and universal God of

Zoroastrianism Zoroastrianism is an Iranian religion and one of the world's oldest organized faiths, based on the teachings of the Iranian-speaking prophet Zoroaster. It has a dualistic cosmology of good and evil within the framework of a monotheisti ...

whose name means light of wisdom in the

Avestan language Avestan (), or historically Zend, is an umbrella term for two Old Iranian languages: Old Avestan (spoken in the 2nd millennium BCE) and Younger Avestan (spoken in the 1st millennium BCE). They are known only from their conjoined use as the scrip ...

. In 1909 the Mazda name was created for the

tungsten Tungsten, or wolfram, is a chemical element with the symbol W and atomic number 74. Tungsten is a rare metal found naturally on Earth almost exclusively as compounds with other elements. It was identified as a new element in 1781 and first isol ...

filament The word filament, which is descended from Latin ''filum'' meaning " thread", is used in English for a variety of thread-like structures, including: Astronomy * Galaxy filament, the largest known cosmic structures in the universe * Solar filament ...

light bulb. GE sold bulbs under this trademark starting in 1909. GE promoted the mark as identifying tungsten filament bulbs with predictable performance and life expectancy. GE also licensed the Mazda name, socket sizes, and tungsten filament technology to other manufacturers to establish a standard for lighting. Bulbs were soon sold by many manufacturers with the Mazda name licensed from GE, including

British Thomson-Houston British Thomson-Houston (BTH) was a British engineering and heavy industrial company, based at Rugby, Warwickshire, England, and founded as a subsidiary of the General Electric Company (GE) of Schenectady, New York, United States. They were kno ...

in the United Kingdom,

Toshiba , commonly known as Toshiba and stylized as TOSHIBA, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. Its diversified products and services include power, industrial and social infrastructure systems, ...

in Japan, and GE's chief competitor Westinghouse. Tungsten-filament bulbs of the Mazda type were initially more costly than carbon filament bulbs, but used less electricity. Often electrical utilities would trade new lamps for consumers' burned-out bulbs. In at least one case the authority regulating energy rates required the utility to use only tungsten bulbs so as not to inflate customer's energy use. Mazda 1917

The company dropped the campaign in 1945. GE's patents on the tungsten filament lamp expired in the late 1930s and other forms of lighting were becoming more important than incandescent bulbs. GE stopped licensing the trademark to other manufacturers, although it continued to renew the trademark registration up to 1990. The registration on trademark no. 77,779 expired in 2000.Carl Sulzberger ''A Bright and Profitable Idea'' in "IEEE Power&Energy Magazine", May/June 2006, pages 70-78 Modern association of the Mazda name is mostly with the

Mazda , commonly referred to as simply Mazda, is a Japanese multinational automotive manufacturer headquartered in Fuchū, Hiroshima, Japan. In 2015, Mazda produced 1.5 million vehicles for global sales, the majority of which (nearly one ...

automobile A car or automobile is a motor vehicle with wheels. Most definitions of ''cars'' say that they run primarily on roads, seat one to eight people, have four wheels, and mainly transport people instead of goods. The year 1886 is regarded ...

manufacturer of Japan (which coexisted with Toshiba's Mazda bulbs in its early years). The Mazda trademark is split between the Japanese manufacturer where it applies to automobiles (including automobile lights and batteries) and GE for non-automotive uses. GE's Mazda bulbs were manufactured by Minneapolis Mazda Lamp Works at a factory in Northeast Minneapolis. From the 1930s until 2012, the building was the headquarters of Minneapolis Public Schools.

Mazda brand licensees

* Westinghouse: Light bulbs * Ediswan (British ''Mazda''): Light bulbs,

vacuum tube A vacuum tube, electron tube, valve (British usage), or tube (North America), is a device that controls electric current flow in a high vacuum between electrodes to which an electric potential difference has been applied. The type known as ...

s *

Compagnie des Lampes La Compagnie des Lampes ("The Lamp Company") was a name used by several French companies all in the area of electrical products particularly lighting. La Compagnie des Lampes (1888) The original ''Compagnie des Lampes'' was set up at Ivry-sur-Se ...

(1921, French ''Mazda''): Light bulbs, vacuum tubes * Compagnie Industrielle Française des Tubes Electroniques (CIFTE): ''Mazda-Belvu'' vacuum tubes (originating from ''Societé Radio Belvu'') * Manufacture Belge des Lampes Électriques (MBLE),^{( fr, nl)} whose research laboratory was headed by

Vitold Belevitch Vitold Belevitch (2 March 1921 – 26 December 1999) was a Belgian mathematician and electrical engineer of Russian origin who produced some important work in the field of electrical network theory. Born to parents fleeing the Bolsheviks, he ...

: Light bulbs as ''Mazda'', but vacuum tubes as ''Adzam'' ("Mazda" spelled backwards) * Compagnie Industrielle des Piles Électriques (''Mazda- CIPEL''): Batteries *

(Japanese ''Mazda''): Light bulbs, vacuum tubes

References

External links

Maxfield Parrish, "Contentment" Edison Mazda Lamp Advertisement
Flickr.com)
Maxfield Parrish, "Contentment" Edison Mazda Lamp Advertisement
Flickr.com, revised link) {{DEFAULTSORT:Mazda (Light Bulb) General Electric Lighting brands Incandescent light bulbs Products introduced in 1909

Mazda brand licensees

See also

References

External links