Mullard
   HOME

TheInfoList



Click Here for Items Related To - Mullard
OR:
Mullard on:   [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Amazon]

Mullard Limited was a British manufacturer of
electronic Electronic may refer to: *Electronics, the science of how to control electric energy in semiconductor * ''Electronics'' (magazine), a defunct American trade journal *Electronic storage, the storage of data using an electronic device *Electronic co ...
components. The Mullard Radio Valve Co. Ltd. of Southfields, London, was founded in 1920 by Captain Stanley R. Mullard, who had previously designed
thermionic valves 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 a ...
for the Admiralty before becoming managing director of the Z Electric Lamp Co. The company soon moved to Hammersmith, London and then in 1923 to Balham, London. The head office in later years was Mullard House at 1–19 Torrington Place, Bloomsbury, now part of
University College London , mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £143 million (2020) , budget = ...
.


Start-up

In 1921, the directors were Sir Ralph Ashton (chairman),
Basil Binyon Basil (, ; ''Ocimum basilicum'' , also called great basil, is a culinary herb of the family Lamiaceae (mints). It is a tender plant, and is used in cuisines worldwide. In Western cuisine, the generic term "basil" refers to the variety also kn ...
of the Radio Communication Co, C.F. Elwell and S.R. Mullard (Managing Director).


Partnership with Philips

In 1923, to meet the technical demands of the newly formed
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
, Mullard formed a partnership with the Dutch manufacturer
Philips Koninklijke Philips N.V. (), commonly shortened to Philips, is a Dutch multinational conglomerate corporation that was founded in Eindhoven in 1891. Since 1997, it has been mostly headquartered in Amsterdam, though the Benelux headquarters i ...
. The
valves A valve is a device or natural object that regulates, directs or controls the flow of a fluid (gases, liquids, fluidized solids, or slurries) by opening, closing, or partially obstructing various passageways. Valves are technically fitting ...
(vacuum tubes) produced in this period were named with the prefix PM, for Philips-Mullard, beginning with the PM3 and PM4 in 1926. Mullard finally sold all its shares to Philips in 1927. In 1928 the company introduced the first pentode valve to the British market.


Factories


Mitcham

Mullard opened a new manufacturing plant at the end of New Road,
Mitcham Mitcham is an area within the London Borough of Merton in South London, England. It is centred southwest of Charing Cross. Originally a village in the county of Surrey, today it is mainly a residential suburb, and includes Mitcham Common. It h ...
, Surrey in 1929. A second building was added in 1936. Both buildings had a very distinctive flat roof construction and were very similar to those at Philips' headquarters in Eindhoven, Netherlands. Co-sited with the Mullard buildings was the manufacturing complex for Philips Radios. Mitcham was also home to the Mullard Application Laboratory.


Blackburn

In the late 1930s Philips opened a plant in
Blackburn Blackburn () is an industrial town and the administrative centre of the Blackburn with Darwen borough in Lancashire, England. The town is north of the West Pennine Moors on the southern edge of the Ribble Valley, east of Preston and north-n ...
, Lancashire, and during the Second World War some operations were moved there from Mitcham; by the end of the war, nearly 3,000 were employed. Tungsten and molybdenum wire were produced on-site from 1954, and a glass factory was built in 1955. In 1962 over 6,200 were employed and Mullard described the Blackburn works as "the largest valve manufacturing plant in Europe". By 1949 Mullard had produced a number of television sets, such as the MTS-521 and MTS-684. In 1951 Mullard was producing the LSD series of photographic flash tubes.


Others

Mullard had factories in
Southport Southport is a seaside town in the Metropolitan Borough of Sefton in Merseyside, England. At the 2001 census, it had a population of 90,336, making it the eleventh most populous settlement in North West England. Southport lies on the Iris ...
and Simonstone, both in Lancashire. The latter closed in 2004. There was also a sister factory at Belmont in
Durham Durham most commonly refers to: *Durham, England, a cathedral city and the county town of County Durham *County Durham, an English county * Durham County, North Carolina, a county in North Carolina, United States *Durham, North Carolina, a city in N ...
(closed in June 2005). Other factories included those at
Fleetwood Fleetwood is a coastal town in the Borough of Wyre in Lancashire, England, at the northwest corner of the Fylde. It had a population of 25,939 at the 2011 census. Fleetwood acquired its modern character in the 1830s, when the principal lando ...
(closed in 1979) and Lytham St. Annes (closed in 1972). A feeder factory at
Haydock Haydock is a village within the Metropolitan Borough of St Helens, in Merseyside, England. At the 2011 Census, it had a population of 11,416 Haydock's historic area covers the Haydock electoral ward and a section of the Blackbrook ward. Haydo ...
closed in 1981. A small factory in Hove closed in the early 1970s.


Teletext

In the early 1980s, Mullard manufactured the
SAA5050 The Mullard SAA5050 was a character generator chip for implementing the Teletext character set. The SAA5050 was used in teletext-equipped television sets, viewdata terminals, and microcomputers, most notably on computers like the Philips P200 ...
, one of the first
teletext A British Ceefax football index page from October 2009, showing the three-digit page numbers for a variety of football news stories Teletext, or broadcast teletext, is a standard for displaying text and rudimentary graphics on suitably equipp ...
character generator modules made in the UK.


Semiconductors

Mullard owned
semiconductor A semiconductor is a material which has an electrical conductivity value falling between that of a conductor, such as copper, and an insulator, such as glass. Its resistivity falls as its temperature rises; metals behave in the opposite way. ...
factories in
Southampton Southampton () is a port city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire in southern England. It is located approximately south-west of London and west of Portsmouth. The city forms part of the South Hampshire built-up area, which also covers Po ...
and Hazel Grove, Stockport, Cheshire. Southampton (Millbrook Trading Estate) was a purpose-built plant, opened in 1957 for the manufacture of
semiconductor A semiconductor is a material which has an electrical conductivity value falling between that of a conductor, such as copper, and an insulator, such as glass. Its resistivity falls as its temperature rises; metals behave in the opposite way. ...
s. Production of germanium alloy
transistor upright=1.4, gate (G), body (B), source (S) and drain (D) terminals. The gate is separated from the body by an insulating layer (pink). A transistor is a semiconductor device used to Electronic amplifier, amplify or electronic switch, switch ...
s was transferred from Mitcham. At the same time the plant started the research, development and production of electro optical devices. Fabrication of planar devices on a mass production basis did not begin until 1966, when germanium sales were decreasing. 1967 saw the start of the development and production of integrated circuits. The plant was planned to be the biggest semiconductor facility in Europe, employing 3,000 people including 200 scientists and engineers. In 1962 Associated Semiconductor Manufacturers (ASM) Ltd was formed by Mullard and GEC to combine the semiconductor development and production facilities of the two companies; Mullard owned two-thirds of the company and included the Southampton plant; GEC contributed their small factory in School Street, Hazel Grove, producing
thyristor A thyristor () is a solid-state semiconductor device with four layers of alternating P- and N-type materials used for high-power applications. It acts exclusively as a bistable switch (or a latch), conducting when the gate receives a current ...
s, rectifiers and power diodes. GEC pulled out of ASM Ltd in 1969. In 1972 production was moved to a newly constructed factory nearby on Bramhall Moor Lane. Both sites were later owned by NXP Semiconductors (formerly
Philips Semiconductors NXP Semiconductors N.V. (NXP) is a Dutch semiconductor designer and manufacturer with headquarters in Eindhoven, Netherlands. The company employs approximately 31,000 people in more than 30 countries. NXP reported revenue of $11.06 billion in 2 ...
). The Southampton site is now closed. The one in Hazel Grove, Stockport specialises in
power semiconductor device A power semiconductor device is a semiconductor device used as a switch or rectifier in power electronics (for example in a switch-mode power supply). Such a device is also called a power device or, when used in an integrated circuit, a power IC ...
s and is now Nexperia Manchester. The first
transistor upright=1.4, gate (G), body (B), source (S) and drain (D) terminals. The gate is separated from the body by an insulating layer (pink). A transistor is a semiconductor device used to Electronic amplifier, amplify or electronic switch, switch ...
s produced by Mullard were the OC50 and OC51 point-contact types in 1952, which were not widely used. In 1953 Mullard moved to junction transistors, beginning with the plastic-cased OC10 series. These were followed by the glass-encapsulated OC43...47, OC70/71, (released in 1957) and OC80 series (the output devices were metal encapsulated to facilitate heatsinking), which were produced in large numbers and copied by other companies, such as
Valvo Valvo is a surname. Notable people with the surname include: *Ángel Lo Valvo (1909–1978), Argentine racing driver *Carmen Marc Valvo, American fashion designer *Michael Valvo (1942–2004), American chess player {{surname ...
(another Philips subsidiary) and Siemens in Germany, and Amperex in the USA. RF transistors were the OC170 and OC171. All these were germanium PNP transistors. Mullard's first silicon transistors were the OC201 to OC207, PNP alloy types using the standard SO-2 metal-over-glass construction such as the OC200 shown. From about 1960 Mullard switched to using the BC prefix for silicon, and AC for germanium, eliminating the confusion of part numbers. in the mid 1960s the first plastic packages were introduced. In 1964 the company produced a prototype electronic desktop calculator as a technology demonstrator for its transistors and
cold cathode A cold cathode is a cathode that is not electrically heated by a filament.A negatively charged electrode emits electrons or is the positively charged terminal. For more, see field emission. A cathode may be considered "cold" if it emits more el ...
indicator tubes.


Space science

In 1957 Philips-Mullard helped to set up the
Mullard Radio Astronomy Observatory The Mullard Radio Astronomy Observatory (MRAO) is located near Cambridge, UK and is home to a number of the largest and most advanced aperture synthesis radio telescopes in the world, including the One-Mile Telescope, 5-km Ryle Telescope, an ...
(MRAO) at the
University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a public collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209 and granted a royal charter by Henry III in 1231, Cambridge is the world's third oldest surviving university and one of its most pr ...
. In 1966 the
Mullard Space Science Laboratory The UCL Mullard Space Science Laboratory (MSSL) is the United Kingdom's largest university space research group. MSSL is part of the Department of Space and Climate Physics at University College London (UCL), one of the first universities in the ...
(MSSL) was opened near Dorking, Surrey as part of
University College London , mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £143 million (2020) , budget = ...
. The
Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...
Mullard Award The Mullard Award is awarded annually by the Royal Society to a person who has "an outstanding academic record in any field of natural science, engineering or technology and whose contribution is currently making or has the potential to make ...
for young scientists and engineers was set up in 1967.


Mullard brand name

Philips continued to use the brand name "Mullard" in the UK until 1988. Mullard Research Laboratories in Redhill, Surrey then became Philips Research Laboratories. As of 2007, the Mullard brand has been revived by
Sovtek Sovtek is a brand of vacuum tube owned by Mike Matthews's New Sensor Corporation and manufactured in Saratov, Russia. They are often used in guitar amplification and include versions of the popular 12AX7, EL84, EL34, and 6L6 vacuum tubes. Many o ...
, producing a variant of the ECC83 and
EL34 The EL34 is a thermionic vacuum tube of the power pentode type. The EL34 was introduced in 1955 by Mullard, who were owned by Philips. The EL34 has an octal base (indicated by the '3' in the part number) and is found mainly in the final output s ...
.


Z Electric Lamp Company

The Z Electric Lamp Co. continued business into the 1970s operating from premises in
Thornton Heath Thornton Heath is a district of Greater London, England, within the London Borough of Croydon. It is around north of the town of Croydon, and south of Charing Cross. Prior to the creation of Greater London in 1965, Thornton Heath was in the Co ...
, southern Greater London, manufacturing lamps of specialised design. However, it closed due to the recession in the mid 1970s.


See also

*
Mullard–Philips tube designation In Europe, the principal method of numbering vacuum tubes ("thermionic valves") was the nomenclature used by the Philips company and its subsidiaries Mullard in the UK, Valvo( de,  it) in Germany, Radiotechnique (''Miniwatt-Dario'' b ...
*
MEL Equipment MEL Equipment was a British manufacturer of radar, avionics and military radio equipment based in West Sussex. History The company was formed as Radio Transmission Equipment in March 1935 in south London. Later it was fully acquired by Philips a ...


50th Anniversary in 1970

To mark the 50th anniversary of the founding of the company, Mullard management decided to have a rose named after the company. Mullard's quest was simple, they wanted a world-beater, nothing less, so they contacted the renowned grower Sam McGredy IV in Northern Ireland. The naming fee of £10,000/$24,000 was a lot of money in 1970 and established a record fee for a new rose : Mullard Jubilee "Electron". To mark the occasion every employee received a "Mullard Jubilee” rose bush.


References


External links

*{{YouTube, id=GDvF89Bh27Y, title=The Blackburn Story – Mullard film, 1960s
Mullard Semiconductors by Andrew WylieSome Mullard History on personal blogHistory of Mullard TubesMullard Valve Works in Blackburn
Defunct technological companies of the United Kingdom Vacuum tubes Guitar amplification tubes Electronics industry in London Electronics companies of the United Kingdom Manufacturing companies based in London Electronics companies established in 1920 History of the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham History of the London Borough of Wandsworth 1920 establishments in England