Mullard
Encyclopedia
Mullard Limited was a British
manufacturer of electronic
components. The Mullard Radio Valve Co. Ltd. of Southfields
, London
, was founded in 1920 by Captain Stanley R. Mullard
, who had previously designed valves for the Admiralty before becoming managing director of the Z Electric Lamp Co. The company soon moved to Hammersmith
, London and then in 1923 to Balham
, London. The head office in later years was Mullard House in Torrington Place, Bloomsbury
, which is now part of University College London
.
, Mullard formed a partnership with the Dutch manufacturer Philips
. The valves
(US vacuum tube) produced in this period were named with the prefix PM, for Philips-Mullard, beginning with the PM3 and PM4 in 1926. Mullard finally sold all its shares to Philips in 1927. In 1928 the company introduced the first pentode
valve to the British market.
, Surrey in 1929. A second building was added in 1936. Both buildings had a very distinctive flat roof construction and were very similar to those at Philips' headquarters in Eindhoven, Netherlands
. Co-sited with the Mullard buildings was the manufacturing complex for Philips Radios. Mitcham was also home to the Mullard Application Laboratory.
sets, such as the MTS-521 and MTS-684. In 1951 Mullard was producing the LSD series of photographic flash tubes.
and Simonstone
, Burnley
both in Lancashire
. The latter was closed in 2004. There was also a sister factory in Durham
. Other factories included those at Fleetwood
(closed in 1979) and Lytham St. Annes (closed in 1972). A feeder factory at Haydock
closed in 1981.
decoding modules made in the UK.
factories in Southampton
and Stockport
. Both sites are now owned by NXP Semiconductors (formerly Philips Semiconductors). The one in Hazel Grove
, Stockport specializes in power semiconductor device
s.
The first transistor
s produced by Mullard were the OC50 and OC51 point-contact types, which were not widely used. In 1953 Mullard moved to junction transistors, beginning with the plastic-cased OC10 series. These were followed by the glass-encapsulated OC70 and OC80 series (the output devices were metal encapsulated to facilitate heatsinking), which were produced in large numbers and copied by other companies, such as Valvo (another Philips subsidiary), Intermetall and Siemens
in Germany, and Amperex in the USA. In 1964 the company produced a prototype electronic desktop calculator
as a technology demonstrator for its transistors and cold cathode
indicator tubes.
(MRAO) at the University of Cambridge
. In 1966 the Mullard Space Science Laboratory
(MSSL) was opened near Dorking
, Surrey
as part of University College London
. The Royal Society
Mullard Award for young scientists and engineers was set up in 1967.
, Surrey
then became Philips Research Laboratories. As of 2007, the Mullard brand has been revived by Sovtek
, producing a variant of the ECC83 and EL34
.
near Croydon
, Surrey, England manufacturing lamps of specialised design. However, they went out of business due to the recession brought about by the high inflation of the mid 1970s.
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
manufacturer of electronic
Electronics
Electronics is the branch of science, engineering and technology that deals with electrical circuits involving active electrical components such as vacuum tubes, transistors, diodes and integrated circuits, and associated passive interconnection technologies...
components. The Mullard Radio Valve Co. Ltd. of Southfields
Southfields
Southfields is a suburban district in the London Borough of Wandsworth, England, situated 5.6 miles south-west of Charing Cross where Serena Frazer lives. Southfields is located partly in the SW18 postcode area and partly in SW19....
, London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, was founded in 1920 by Captain Stanley R. Mullard
Stanley R. Mullard
Stanley Robert Mullard, was an English industrialist who founded the Mullard electronics company.-Early life:Stanley Mullard was born in Bermondsey, London in 1883, the son of Robert Mullard...
, who had previously designed valves for the Admiralty before becoming managing director of the Z Electric Lamp Co. The company soon moved to Hammersmith
Hammersmith
Hammersmith is an urban centre in the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham in west London, England, in the United Kingdom, approximately five miles west of Charing Cross on the north bank of the River Thames...
, London and then in 1923 to Balham
Balham
Balham is a district of London, EnglandBalham can also refer to:*Balham, Ardennes, a commune in France*Balham station, railway and tube station in Balham, London*Balaam, a Biblical figure...
, London. The head office in later years was Mullard House in Torrington Place, Bloomsbury
Bloomsbury
-Places:* Bloomsbury is an area in central London.* Bloomsbury , related local government unit* Bloomsbury, New Jersey, New Jersey, USA* Bloomsbury , listed on the NRHP in Maryland...
, which is now part of University College London
University College London
University College London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and the oldest and largest constituent college of the federal University of London...
.
Partnership with Philips
In 1923, in order to meet the technical demands of the newly formed BBCBBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
, Mullard formed a partnership with the Dutch manufacturer Philips
Philips
Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V. , more commonly known as Philips, is a multinational Dutch electronics company....
. The valves
Vacuum tube
In electronics, a vacuum tube, electron tube , or thermionic valve , reduced to simply "tube" or "valve" in everyday parlance, is a device that relies on the flow of electric current through a vacuum...
(US vacuum tube) produced in this period were named with the prefix PM, for Philips-Mullard, beginning with the PM3 and PM4 in 1926. Mullard finally sold all its shares to Philips in 1927. In 1928 the company introduced the first pentode
Pentode
A pentode is an electronic device having five active electrodes. The term most commonly applies to a three-grid vacuum tube , which was invented by the Dutchman Bernhard D.H. Tellegen in 1926...
valve to the British market.
Mitcham
Mullard opened a new manufacturing plant at MitchamMitcham
Mitcham is a district in the south west area of London, in the London Borough of Merton. A suburban area, Mitcham is located on the border of Inner London and Outer London. It is both residentially and financially developed, well served by Transport for London, and home to Mitcham Town Centre,...
, Surrey in 1929. A second building was added in 1936. Both buildings had a very distinctive flat roof construction and were very similar to those at Philips' headquarters in Eindhoven, Netherlands
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
. Co-sited with the Mullard buildings was the manufacturing complex for Philips Radios. Mitcham was also home to the Mullard Application Laboratory.
Blackburn
In the late 1930s Mullard opened a new plant in Blackburn, Lancashire. By 1949 Mullard had produced a number of televisionTelevision
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
sets, such as the MTS-521 and MTS-684. In 1951 Mullard was producing the LSD series of photographic flash tubes.
Others
Mullard had factories in SouthportSouthport
Southport is a seaside town in the Metropolitan Borough of Sefton in Merseyside, England. During the 2001 census Southport was recorded as having a population of 90,336, making it the eleventh most populous settlement in North West England...
and Simonstone
Simonstone, Lancashire
Simonstone is a small, largely residential, village in the Ribble Valley area of East Lancashire about west of Padiham, west of Burnley and south of Pendle Hill...
, Burnley
Burnley
Burnley is a market town in the Burnley borough of Lancashire, England, with a population of around 73,500. It lies north of Manchester and east of Preston, at the confluence of the River Calder and River Brun....
both in Lancashire
Lancashire
Lancashire is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in the North West of England. It takes its name from the city of Lancaster, and is sometimes known as the County of Lancaster. Although Lancaster is still considered to be the county town, Lancashire County Council is based in Preston...
. The latter was closed in 2004. There was also a sister factory in Durham
Durham
Durham is a city in north east England. It is within the County Durham local government district, and is the county town of the larger ceremonial county...
. Other factories included those at Fleetwood
Fleetwood
Fleetwood is a town within the Wyre district of Lancashire, England, lying at the northwest corner of the Fylde. It had a population of 26,840 people at the 2001 Census. It forms part of the Greater Blackpool conurbation. The town was the first planned community of the Victorian era...
(closed in 1979) and Lytham St. Annes (closed in 1972). A feeder factory at Haydock
Haydock
Haydock is a village within the Metropolitan Borough of St Helens, in Merseyside, England. It contains all of the Haydock electoral ward and a section of the Blackbrook electoral ward. The village is located roughly mid-way between Liverpool and Manchester, close to the junction of the M6 motorway...
closed in 1981.
Teletext
In the early 1980s, Mullard manufactured the SAA5050, some of the earliest teletextTeletext
Teletext is a television information retrieval service developed in the United Kingdom in the early 1970s. It offers a range of text-based information, typically including national, international and sporting news, weather and TV schedules...
decoding modules made in the UK.
Semiconductors
Mullard owned semiconductorSemiconductor
A semiconductor is a material with electrical conductivity due to electron flow intermediate in magnitude between that of a conductor and an insulator. This means a conductivity roughly in the range of 103 to 10−8 siemens per centimeter...
factories in Southampton
Southampton
Southampton is the largest city in the county of Hampshire on the south coast of England, and is situated south-west of London and north-west of Portsmouth. Southampton is a major port and the closest city to the New Forest...
and Stockport
Metropolitan Borough of Stockport
The Metropolitan Borough of Stockport is a metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, in north west England, centred around the town of Stockport. It has a population of about 280,600 and includes the outyling areas of Cheadle and Cheadle Hulme, Marple, Bredbury, Reddish and Romiley...
. Both sites are now owned by NXP Semiconductors (formerly Philips Semiconductors). The one in Hazel Grove
Hazel Grove
-Education:Hazel Grove has a number of primary schools and Hazel Grove High School, the local high school. Some do decide to go to other local high schools, such as local Marple Hall, in neighbouring village Marple. The main primary schools in the area are, Hazel Grove Primary School, Torkington...
, Stockport specializes in power semiconductor device
Power semiconductor device
Power semiconductor devices are semiconductor devices used as switches or rectifiers in power electronic circuits . They are also called power devices or when used in integrated circuits, called power ICs....
s.
The first transistor
Transistor
A transistor is a semiconductor device used to amplify and switch electronic signals and power. It is composed of a semiconductor material with at least three terminals for connection to an external circuit. A voltage or current applied to one pair of the transistor's terminals changes the current...
s produced by Mullard were the OC50 and OC51 point-contact types, which were not widely used. In 1953 Mullard moved to junction transistors, beginning with the plastic-cased OC10 series. These were followed by the glass-encapsulated OC70 and OC80 series (the output devices were metal encapsulated to facilitate heatsinking), which were produced in large numbers and copied by other companies, such as Valvo (another Philips subsidiary), Intermetall and Siemens
Siemens AG
Siemens AG is a German multinational conglomerate company headquartered in Munich, Germany. It is the largest Europe-based electronics and electrical engineering company....
in Germany, and Amperex in the USA. In 1964 the company produced a prototype electronic desktop calculator
Calculator
An electronic calculator is a small, portable, usually inexpensive electronic device used to perform the basic operations of arithmetic. Modern calculators are more portable than most computers, though most PDAs are comparable in size to handheld calculators.The first solid-state electronic...
as a technology demonstrator for its transistors and cold cathode
Cold cathode
A cold cathode is a cathode used within nixie tubes, gas discharge lamps, discharge tubes, and some types of vacuum tube which is not electrically heated by the circuit to which it is connected...
indicator tubes.
Space science
In 1957 Philips-Mullard helped to set up the Mullard Radio Astronomy ObservatoryMullard Radio Astronomy Observatory
Mullard Radio Astronomy Observatory is home to a number of large aperture synthesis radio telescopes, including the One-Mile Telescope, 5-km Ryle Telescope, and the Arcminute Microkelvin Imager...
(MRAO) at the University of Cambridge
University of Cambridge
The University of Cambridge is a public research university located in Cambridge, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest university in both the United Kingdom and the English-speaking world , and the seventh-oldest globally...
. In 1966 the Mullard Space Science Laboratory
Mullard Space Science Laboratory
The UCL Mullard Space Science Laboratory is the United Kingdom's largest university space research group. MSSL is the Department of Space and Climate Physics of the University College London. UCL was one of the first universities in the world to conduct space research...
(MSSL) was opened near Dorking
Dorking
Dorking is a historic market town at the foot of the North Downs approximately south of London, in Surrey, England.- History and development :...
, Surrey
Surrey
Surrey is a county in the South East of England and is one of the Home Counties. The county borders Greater London, Kent, East Sussex, West Sussex, Hampshire and Berkshire. The historic county town is Guildford. Surrey County Council sits at Kingston upon Thames, although this has been part of...
as part of University College London
University College London
University College London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and the oldest and largest constituent college of the federal University of London...
. The Royal Society
Royal Society
The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...
Mullard Award for young scientists and engineers was set up in 1967.
Mullard brand name
Philips continued to use the brand name "Mullard" in the UK until 1988. Mullard Research Laboratories in RedhillRedhill, Surrey
Redhill is a town in the borough of Reigate and Banstead, Surrey, England and is part of the London commuter belt. Redhill and the adjacent town of Reigate form a single urban area.-History:...
, Surrey
Surrey
Surrey is a county in the South East of England and is one of the Home Counties. The county borders Greater London, Kent, East Sussex, West Sussex, Hampshire and Berkshire. The historic county town is Guildford. Surrey County Council sits at Kingston upon Thames, although this has been part of...
then became Philips Research Laboratories. As of 2007, the Mullard brand has been revived by Sovtek
Sovtek
Sovtek is a brand of vacuum tube owned by Mike Matthews's New Sensor Corporation and manufactured in Saratov, Russia. They are often used in guitar amplification and include the popular variants of the 12AX7, EL84, EL34, and 6L6 models...
, producing a variant of the ECC83 and EL34
EL34
The EL34 is a thermionic valve or vacuum tube of the power pentode type. It has an international octal base and is found mainly in the final output stages of audio amplification circuits and was designed to be suitable as a series regulator by virtue of its high permissible voltage between heater...
.
Z Electric Lamp Company
The Z Electric Lamp Co. continued business into the 1970s operating from premises in Thornton HeathThornton Heath
Thornton Heath is a district of south London, England, in the London Borough of Croydon. It is situated south-southeast of Charing Cross.-Geography:...
near Croydon
Croydon
Croydon is a town in South London, England, located within the London Borough of Croydon to which it gives its name. It is situated south of Charing Cross...
, Surrey, England manufacturing lamps of specialised design. However, they went out of business due to the recession brought about by the high inflation of the mid 1970s.