Standard Telecommunication Laboratories was the UK research centre for

Standard Telephones and Cables Standard Telephones and Cables Ltd (later STC plc) was a British manufacturer of telephone, telegraph, radio, telecommunications, and related equipment. During its history, STC invented and developed several groundbreaking new technologies incl ...

(STC). Initially based in Enfield, North London, and moved to Harlow Essex in 1959. STC was a subsidiary of ITT.

Notable Achievements

It is now recognised as the birthplace of optical fibre communications, for it is here that Sir Charles K. Kao,

George Hockham George Alfred Hockham FREng FIET (7 December 1938 – 16 September 2013) was a British engineer. He worked for over 40 years in theoretical analysis and design techniques applied to the solution of electromagnetic problems covering many dif ...

and others pioneered the use of single-mode optical fibre made from low loss glass. In 2009 Charles Kao was awarded the 2009 Nobel Prize in Physics, for pioneering optical fibre communication. Another famous name associated with STL is

Alec Reeves Alec Harley Reeves (10 March 1902 – 13 October 1971) was a British scientist best known for his invention of pulse-code modulation (PCM). He was awarded 82 patents. Early life Alec Reeves was born in Redhill, Surrey in 1902 and was educated at ...

, previously famous for inventing

pulse-code modulation Pulse-code modulation (PCM) is a method used to digitally represent sampled analog signals. It is the standard form of digital audio in computers, compact discs, digital telephony and other digital audio applications. In a PCM stream, the a ...

while working at the Paris labs of the parent company ITT in 1938, and for his invention of the wartime bomber navigation system OBOE. Alec headed a team working on various means of optical communication, prior to the emergence of glass optical fibre as the leading contender.

Ownership

In 1991, the laboratories became a part of

Bell Northern Research Bell-Northern Research (BNR) was a telecommunications research and development company established In 1971 when Bell Canada and Northern Electric combined their R&D organizations. It was jointly owned by Bell Canada and Northern Telecom. BNR wa ...

(BNR), following the acquisition of STC by

Northern Telecom Northern may refer to the following: Geography * North, a point in direction * Northern Europe, the northern part or region of Europe * Northern Highland, a region of Wisconsin, United States * Northern Province, Sri Lanka * Northern Range, a ra ...

, which later became

Nortel Nortel Networks Corporation (Nortel), formerly Northern Telecom Limited, was a Canadian Multinational corporation, multinational telecommunications and data networking equipment manufacturer headquartered in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It was foun ...

. Nortel subsequently encountered financial difficulties, and was broken up and sold off. The last remnants of the laboratories at the Harlow, Essex site, have now disappeared.

Redevelopment Of Laboratories Site

Since the collapse of Nortel, the site has been redeveloped into a new high-technology business development called KAOPARK.

References

External links

A Brief History of STL - By Vi Maile
{{coord missing, Essex Buildings and structures in the London Borough of Enfield Buildings and structures in Essex Fiber-optic communications Harlow History of telecommunications in the United Kingdom ITT Inc. Research and development organizations Research institutes in England Science and technology in Essex Telecommunications organizations