The General Electric Company or GEC was a major British-based industrial conglomerate, involved in consumer and defence electronics, communications and engineering. The company was once a constituent of the FT 30 and FTSE 100 Index.
In December 1999, GEC was renamed to Marconi plc and became a telecommunications focused company; when its defence arm, Marconi Electronic Systems was amalgamated with British Aerospace to form BAE Systems. The financial troubles that followed the burst of the dot-com bubble in 2000/2001, led to the May 2003 restructuring of Marconi plc to Marconi Corporation plc.
In 2005, Ericsson purchased the bulk of Marconi Corporation plc, along with its principal subsidiary, Marconi Communications. The remainder of the business was renamed Telent.
Famous quotes containing the words general, electric and/or company:
“That sort of half sigh, which, accompanied by two or three slight nods of the head, is pity’s small change in general society.”
—Charles Dickens (1812–1870)
“The more I see of democracy the more I dislike it. It just brings everything down to the mere vulgar level of wages and prices, electric light and water closets, and nothing else.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)
“Is not disease the rule of existence? There is not a lily pad floating on the river but has been riddled by insects. Almost every shrub and tree has its gall, oftentimes esteemed its chief ornament and hardly to be distinguished from the fruit. If misery loves company, misery has company enough. Now, at midsummer, find me a perfect leaf or fruit.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)