|
GEC Traction Limited was a British industrial company formed in 1972 which designed and manufactured electric traction equipment for railway rolling stock. The company had manufacturing sites at Manchester, Preston and Sheffield and was a wholly owned subsidiary of Lord Weinstock's General Electric Company plc. == History == The company's pedigree is traced back to a long list of British companies involved in railway traction almost to the start of the railway age in the first half of the 19th century.〔Bradley, Rodger P, ''Power for the World's Railways, GEC TRACTION and its predecessors'', Oxford Publishing Co, Yeovil, Somerset, 1993. ISBN 0-86093-413-6〕 Included in the list of predecessor companies〔GEC Traction Limited publication GET/GP/3501 067350 GSP〕 are the following, : * Robert Stephenson & Company, Newcastle-upon-Tyne (1823) : * Dick, Kerr & Company, Kilmarnock & Preston (1883) : * Siemens Brothers (UK), London (1858) : * Vulcan Foundry Limited, Newton-le-Willows (1847) : * British Westinghouse Co. Ltd, Manchester (1899) : * English Electric Company, London, Stafford & Preston (1917) : * British Thomson-Houston, Rugby (1896) : * Metropolitan Vickers Electrical Manufacturing Co Ltd, Manchester (1919) : * Associated Electrical Industries Ltd, Manchester & London (1925) : * Beyer-Peacock Ltd, Stockton (1949) The immediate history stemmed from the 1968 acquisition of Associated Electrical Industries (AEI) by GEC. In the following year GEC merged with (took over) the English Electric Co (EE), thus bringing together the two previously rival companies, AEI and EE, under single ownership. From this, in 1969, a new subsidiary company was born, English Electric-AEI Traction Ltd. This new organisation slowly integrated together the traction divisions of both AEI and EE, culminating in 1972 when the company was renamed GEC Traction Ltd. Also added to the company was the Industrial Locomotive Division of the former English Electric which was based at Vulcan Works, Newton-le-Willows (this later became a separate company, GEC Industrial Locomotives Ltd). The company that became GEC Traction Ltd. was originally incorporated on 6 May 1927 In June 1973, the Company celebrated "150 years in Motive Power" dating from the establishment of the first company in the world specifically created for the design and manufacture of railway locomotives, this being the Robert Stephenson & Co in Newcastle. For the greater part of the 18 years in which the Company existed under the name GEC Traction, it was the leading supplier of traction equipment in the UK and also had wide markets around the world, particularly in South Africa, Australasia, Hong Kong, South Korea and Taiwan. Employment across the three sites totalled 3,500 people. In 1984, largely as a result of a cut back in orders by South African Railways, the Attercliffe Common works at Sheffield was closed, with the rotating machines business being absorbed at Preston and gear manufacture at GEC Machines, Rugby. In April 1989, the Company was conferred with the Queen's Award for Technological Achievement in the field of electronic railway propulsion equipment. Only a few weeks after having gained this honour, a merger was agreed between the power and transport businesses of GEC and those of Alsthom of France, part of Compagnie Générale d'Electricité (CGE). As a result, GEC Traction became a subsidiary of this newly formed Anglo-French group, GEC Alsthom, and was consequently renamed GEC Alsthom Traction Ltd on 1 July 1989. As part of a rationalisation of the business the Company was further contracted from 1991 to 1998 with the eventual closing of all activities at Trafford Park in 1998, and the remaining business being concentrated at Preston or transferred to sites in France. In December 1997, GEC and Alcatel Alsthom of France announced a floatation of their joint venture on the Paris stock exchange, to comprise 52% of the share capital, with each of the partners reducing to 24% of the shares each. The company was successfully floated in June 1998 and changed to the simpler, single name, Alstom. GEC and Alcatel subsequently sold their remaining stakes. All references to the 'GEC' name and branding was removed from the ex-GEC businesses which remained in Alstom. GEC Alsthom Traction Ltd. became Alstom Traction Ltd. on 22 June 1998 and the company name survived to 19 August 2008 but increasingly integrated within the Transport division of Alstom. Today, the Alstom Transport factory at Preston is the only remaining site of the former GEC Traction that is still operating, albeit on a much reduced scale to that in the 1970s and 80s. Having suffered around 500 job losses in August 2003, the Preston site was reported to be employing "around 240 people" in October 2010 .〔Lancashire Evening Post, 8 October 2010〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「GEC Traction」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|