Wallenberg era begins Įricsson was saved from bankruptcy and closure with the help of banks including Stockholms Enskilda Bank (now Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken) and other Swedish investment banks controlled by the Wallenberg family, and some Swedish government backing. Kreuger started showing interest in the company, being a major owner of Wincrantz holding companies. The company was renamed Telefonaktiebolaget L M Ericsson. Wincrantz was partly funded by Ivar Kreuger, an international financier. The acquisition of other telecommunications companies put pressure on Ericsson's finances in 1925, Karl Fredric Wincrantz took control of the company by acquiring most of the shares. World War I, the subsequent Great Depression, and the loss of its Russian assets after the Revolution slowed the company's development while sales to other countries fell by about half. Telephones of this period had a simpler design and finish, and many of the early automatic desk telephones in Ericsson's catalogues were magneto styles with a dial on the front and appropriate changes to the electronics. Their first dial telephone was produced in 1921, although sales of the early automatic switching systems were slow until the equipment had proven itself on the world's markets.
LM Ericsson's former headquarters at Telefonplan in Stockholm, see LM Ericsson buildingĮricsson ignored the growth of automatic telephony in the United States and concentrated on manual exchange designs. With his company now multinational, Lars Ericsson stepped down from the company in 1901. South Africa and China were also generating significant sales. Sales in Mexico led to inroads into South American countries.
The Bell Group, Kellogg and Automatic Electric dominated the market. ĭespite their successes elsewhere, Ericsson did not make significant sales into the United States. Mass production techniques now firmly established telephones were losing some of their ornate finish and decoration. These included Australia and New Zealand, which by the late 1890s were Ericsson's largest non-European markets. Other countries and colonies were exposed to Ericsson products through the influence of their parent countries.
The Nordic countries were also Ericsson customers they were encouraged by the growth of telephone services in Sweden. In the UK, the National Telephone Company was a major customer by 1897 sold 28% of its output in the UK. The UK ( Ericsson Telephones Ltd.) and Russia were early markets, where factories were later established improve the chances of gaining local contracts and to augment the output of the Swedish factory. Ltd., of Nottingham, England, it is now in the collection of Thinktank, Birmingham Science Museum.Īs production grew in the late 1890s, and the Swedish market seemed to be reaching saturation, Ericsson expanded into foreign markets through a number of agents. Īn early, wooden, Ericsson telephone, made by the Ericsson Telephone Co.
Įricsson is the inventor of Bluetooth technology. The Wallenbergs and the Handelsbanken sphere acquired their voting-strong A-shares, and thus the control of Ericsson, after the fall of the Kreuger empire in the early 1930s. The company was founded in 1876 by Lars Magnus Ericsson and is jointly controlled by the Wallenberg family through its holding company Investor AB and the investment company Industrivärden. Įricsson has been a major contributor to the development of the telecommunications industry and is one of the leaders in 5G. Ericsson has over 57,000 granted patents. The company employs around 100,000 people and operates in more than 180 countries. The company sells infrastructure, software, and services in information and communications technology for telecommunications service providers and enterprises, including, among others, 3G, 4G, and 5G equipment, and Internet Protocol (IP) and optical transport systems. Telephone Stock Company of LM Ericsson), commonly known as Ericsson, is a Swedish multinational networking and telecommunications company headquartered in Stockholm.