Beginnings
Sebastian Ziani de Ferranti established his first business Ferranti, Thompson and Ince in 1882.[2] The company developed the Ferranti-Thompson Alternator. Ferranti focused on alternating current power distribution early on, and was one of the few UK experts. In 1885 Dr. Ferranti established a new business, with Francis Ince and Charles Sparks as partners, known as S.Z. de Ferranti.[3] According to J.F. Wilson,[4] Dr. Ferranti's association with the electricity meter persuaded Ince to partner him in this new venture, and meter development was fundamental to the survival and growth of his business for several decades to come.
Despite being a prime exponent of alternating current, Ferranti became an important supplier to many electric utility firms and power-distribution companies for both AC and DC meters.[5] In 1887, the London Electric Supply Corporation (LESCo) hired Dr. Ferranti for the design of their power station at Deptford. He designed the building, the generating plant and the distribution system and on its completion in October 1890, it was the first truly modern power station. It supplied high-voltage AC power at 10,000 volts, which was transformed to a lower voltage for consumer use where required.[2]
Success followed and Ferranti started producing electrical equipment (especially transformers) for sale. Soon the company was looking for considerably more manufacturing space. Land prices in the London area were too high, so the company moved to Hollinwood in Oldham in 1896.[3] In July 1901, Ferranti Limited was formed, specifically to take over the assets of S.Z. de Ferranti Ltd and raise equity, but failed to impress potential new investors as it was still dominated by family ownership. Over-optimistic market projections in the boom of 1896–1903, declining revenues and liquidity problems, forced the company bankers Parrs to send the company into receivership in 1903.[4]
The business was restructured in 1905, Dr. Ferranti's shareholding being reduced to less than 10%.[3] For the next eleven years the company was run by receiver managers and Dr. Ferranti was effectively excluded from commercial financial strategies. He spent much of this period working in partnership with the likes of J.P. Coats of Paisley on cotton spinning machinery and Vickers on re-superheating turbines.[4]
Expansion
Through the early part of the century power was supplied by small companies, typically as an offshoot of plant set up to provide power to local industry. Each plant supplied a different standard, which made the mass production of domestic electrical equipment inefficient. In 1910, Dr. Ferranti made a presidential speech to the IEE addressing this issue, but it would be another sixteen years before the commencement of the National Grid in 1926.[4]
In 1912, in a move driven by A.B. Anderson, the Ferranti Managing Director, Ferranti formed a company in Canada, Ferranti Electric, to exploit the overseas meter market. But in 1914, two significant events happened, Anderson drowned on his return from Canada in the Empress of Ireland sinking and the outbreak of WWI signalled an opportunity for Dr. Ferranti to once again get involved in day-to-day events in the company. He wanted to get involved in the manufacture of shells and fuzes but it wasn't until 1915 that he finally convinced the board to accept this. As a result of this work Ferranti were in a healthier financial position at the end of the war.[6] High voltage power transformers became an important product for Ferranti;[3] some of the largest types weighed over a hundred tons. Dr. Ferranti's son Vincent
Defence electronics
During World War II, Ferranti became a major supplier of electronics, fuzes, valves, and was, through development of the Identification Friend or Foe (IFF) system, heavily involved in the early development of radar in the United Kingdom.[3] In the post-war era, this became a large segment of the company, with various branches supplying radar sets, avionics and other military electronics, both in the UK and the various international offices. In 1943, Ferranti opened a factory at Crewe Toll in Edinburgh to manufacture gyro gunsights for the Spitfire aircraft.[3] After the war they set up Ferranti Research to complement this business which grew to employ 8,000 staff in 8 locations, becoming the birthplace of the Scottish electronics industry,[10] and a major contributor to company profitability. Later products included solid state ring laser gyros.
From 1949, Ferranti-Packard assisted the Royal Canadian Navy develop DATAR (Digital Automated Tracking and Resolving). DATAR was a pioneering computerized battlefield information system that combined
Industrial electronics
The company began marketing optical position measuring equipment for machine tools in 1956.[22] Moire fringes produced by diffraction gratings were the basis for the position measurement. In the late 1980s there were several sections of the company involved in non-military areas. These included portable Market Research Terminals (Ferranti Computer Systems), microwave communications equipment (Ferranti Communications), and petrol (gas) station pumps (Ferranti Autocourt). Both of the latter departments were based at Dalkeith, Scotland.
Computers
In the late 1940s Ferranti joined with various university-based research groups to develop computers. Their first effort was the Ferranti Mark 1, completed in 1951,[3] with about nine delivered between 1951 and 1957. The Pegasus introduced in 1956 was their most popular valve (vacuum tube) system,[23] with 38 units sold. Circa 1956, Ivan Idelson, at Ferranti, originated the Cluff–Foster–Idelson coding of characters on 7-track paper tape for a BSI committee.[24] This also inspired the development of ASCII.[23]
In collaboration with the Victoria University of Manchester they built a new version of the famous Mark 1 that replaced valve diodes with solid state versions, which allowed the speed to be increased dramatically as well as increasing reliability.[25]
Semiconductors
Ferranti had been involved in the production of electronic devices, including radio valves, cathode-ray tubes and germanium semiconductors for some time before it became the first European company to produce a silicon diode, in 1955. In 1972 they launched the ZN414, a single-chip AM radio integrated circuit in a 3-pin package.
Ferranti Semiconductor Ltd. went on to produce a range of silicon bipolar devices, including, in 1977, the Ferranti F100-L, an early 16-bit microprocessor with 16-bit addressing.[28] An F100-L was carried into space on the amateur radio satellite UoSAT-1 (OSCAR 9). Ferranti's ZTX series bipolar transistors gave their name to the inheritor of Ferranti Semiconductor's discrete semiconductor business, Zetex Semiconductors plc.[29]
In the early 1980s, Ferranti produced some of the first large uncommitted logic arrays (ULAs), used in home computers such as the Sinclair ZX81
Acquisition of International Signal and Control
In 1987 Ferranti purchased International Signal and Control (ISC), a United States defence contractor based in Pennsylvania.[31] The company subsequently changed its name to Ferranti International PLC. and restructured the combined business into the following divisions: Ferranti Computer Systems, Ferranti Defence Systems, Ferranti Dynamics, Ferranti Satcomms, Ferranti Telecoms, Ferranti Technologies and International Signal and Control.
Collapse
Unknown to Ferranti, ISC's business primarily consisted of illegal arms sales started at the behest of various US clandestine organizations. On paper the company looked to be extremely profitable on sales of high-priced "above board" items, but these profits were essentially non-existent. With the sale to Ferranti all illegal sales ended immediately, leaving the company with no obvious cash flow.[31]
In 1989 the UK's Serious Fraud Office started criminal investigation regarding alleged massive fraud at ISC. In December 1991 James Guerin, founder of ISC and co-chairman of the merged company, pleaded guilty before the federal court in Philadelphia to fraud committed both in the US and UK. All offences which would have formed part of any UK prosecution were encompassed by the US trial and as such no UK trial proceeded.[31]
The financial and legal difficulties that resulted forced Ferranti into bankruptcy in December 1993.[3]
