VTech Innovation, L.P.,

doing business as A trade name, trading name, or business name is a pseudonym used by companies that do not operate under their registered company name. The term for this type of alternative name is fictitious business name. Registering the fictitious name with ...

Advanced American Telephones, is a

telephone A telephone, colloquially referred to as a phone, is a telecommunications device that enables two or more users to conduct a conversation when they are too far apart to be easily heard directly. A telephone converts sound, typically and most ...

manufacturing company.

History

American Bell Consumer Products was created on January 1, 1983, as a unit of American Bell, Inc., upon declaration by the

Modification of Final Judgment In United States telecommunication law, the Modification of Final Judgment (MFJ) is the August 24, 1982 consent decree concerning the antitrust lawsuit of January 14, 1949, ''United States vs. Western Electric Company and American Telephone and Tel ...

that

American Telephone & Telegraph AT&T Corporation, an abbreviation for its former name, the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, was an American telecommunications company that provided voice, video, data, and Internet telecommunications and professional services to busi ...

(AT&T)Not to be confused with the AT&T of 2005 and later, a renaming of SBC Communications, Inc. had to sell equipment to the public through an entirely separate subsidiary. American Bell Consumer Products sold terminal equipment traditionally available through the

Bell System The Bell System was a system of telecommunication companies, led by the Bell Telephone Company and later by the AT&T Corporation, American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T), that dominated the telephone services industry in North America fo ...

, such as the Trimline telephone. American Bell products could be found at Bell PhoneCenter Stores, as well as department stores such as

Sears Sears, Roebuck and Co., commonly known as Sears ( ), is an American chain of department stores and online retailer founded in 1892 by Richard Warren Sears and Alvah Curtis Roebuck and reincorporated in 1906 by Richard Sears and Julius Rosen ...

and Target. American Bell products were not marked with any Bell name, but simply marked "Western Electric" and the Bell logo, as any products sold through American Bell were ''not'' "

Property". Upon the divestiture of the Bell Operating Companies from AT&T, American Bell was renamed AT&T Information Systems, and American Bell Consumer Products was renamed AT&T Consumer Products, and Bell PhoneCenters were renamed AT&T PhoneCenters. Bell and

Western Electric Western Electric Co., Inc. was an American electrical engineering and manufacturing company that operated from 1869 to 1996. A subsidiary of the AT&T Corporation for most of its lifespan, Western Electric was the primary manufacturer, supplier, ...

markings were replaced with AT&T on telephone housings. AT&T Consumer Products became responsible for leased telephones and manufactured telephones on January 1, 1984. AT&T Consumer Products was absorbed into AT&T Technologies in 1989. AT&T Consumer Products ceased operations of AT&T Phone Centers in 1995, deciding to simply focus on leasing equipment and on sales at department stores. It, along with the rest of AT&T Technologies and Bell Laboratories, became a part of

Lucent Technologies Lucent Technologies, Inc. was an American Multinational corporation, multinational telecommunications equipment company headquartered in Murray Hill, New Jersey, Murray Hill, New Jersey. It was established on September 30, 1996, through the div ...

in 1996, following completion of its spinoff from AT&T. Lucent Technologies Consumer Products, L.P. (LTCP) became the new name of AT&T Consumer Products in 1996. Its operations remained largely unchanged from its operations at AT&T. In 1997, LTCP was placed in the unsuccessful Philips Consumer Communications joint venture. LTCP was retained after the venture failed. In 2000, Lucent opted to reorganize its equipment units, spinning off its Networks Systems unit as

Avaya Avaya LLC(), formerly Avaya Inc., is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Morristown, New Jersey, that provides cloud communications and workstream collaboration services. The company's platform includes unified commun ...

, and selling off its Consumer Products unit. Its telephone leasing operation was sold to Consumer Phone Services, and its consumer telephone manufacturing division was purchased by VTech on April 2, 2000.

Today

Renamed VTech Innovation, L.P., the former LTCP manufacturing division does business as Advanced American Telephones. Telephone production was abruptly shifted to

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

. Advanced American Telephones also entered a 20 licensing agreement with AT&T to use the AT&T brand on all telephones it would produce. In addition, Advanced American Telephones manufactured phones serve as a portrayal of AT&T's home phone service and are seen in ads for it. Phones made today by Advanced American Telephones primarily include

cordless telephone A cordless telephone or portable telephone has a portable telephone handset that connects by radio to a base station connected to the public telephone network. The operational range is limited, usually to the same building or within some short ...

s and some corded phones, such as Trimline, and some multi-line desk phones. Advanced American Telephones also holds the trademark rights to the Trimline and Design Line names, as well as others. They also produce answering machines.

References and notes

External links

AT&T Phone StoreHistory of VTech
{{AT&T Spinoffs Alcatel-Lucent Former AT&T subsidiaries VTech