Samsung

The Samsung Group is a multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Samsung Town, Seoul, South Korea. It is the world's largest conglomerate by revenue with an annual revenue of US$173.4 billion in 2008 and is South Korea's largest chaebol. The meaning of the Korean hanja word Samsung is "tristar" or "three stars".

The Samsung Group is composed of numerous international affiliated business, most of them united under the Samsung brand including Samsung Electronics, the world's largest electrocnics company, Samsung Heavy Industries, the world's second largest shipbuilder and Samsung C&T, a major global construction company. Samsung has been the world's most popular consumer electronics brand since 2005 and is the best known South Korean brand in the world. Samsung Group accounts for more than 20% of South Korea's total exports and is the leader in many domestic industries, such as the financial, chemical, retail and entertainment industries. The company's strong influence in South Korea is visible throughout the nation, which has been referred to as the "Republic of Samsung"

Samsung Group accounts for more than 20% of South Korea's total exports^[10] and in many domestic industries, Samsung Group is the sole monopoly dominating a single market, its revenue as large as some countries' total GDP. In 2006, Samsung Group would have been the 34th largest economy in the world if ranked, larger than that of Argentina. The company has a powerful influence on the country's economic development, politics, media and culture, being a major driving force behind the Miracle on the Han River; many businesses today use its international success as a role model. Click here for some Samsung products.

Pyrex

Pyrex is a brand name for glassware, introduced by Corning Incorporated in 1915. Originally, Pyrex was made from thermal shock resistant borosilicate glass. In 1998, Corning sold its consumer products division which subsequently adopted the name World Kitchen. Pyrex kitchen glassware manufactured and licensed for sale in the United States is now made of tempered soda lime glass at the World Kitchen facility in Charleroi, Pennsylvania. Pyrex products for the European Union continue to be made of borosilicate glass in France. Pyrex laboratory glassware is also still made of borosilicate glass.

According to Carroll Gantz, Dr. Jesse Littleton of Corning discovered the cooking potential of borosilicate glass by presenting his wife with a makeshift casserole dish made from a cut down Nonex (a low expansion glass developed in 1908 by Dr. Eugene Sullivan) battery jar. Corning went on to remove lead from the formula, and Pyrex was born.

Though borosilicates had been produced before the Pyrex brand, the name Pyrex is widely used as a genericized trademark for the material. The brand in Europe, the Middle East and Africa is currently owned by ARC International who acquired the European business in early 2006 from Newell Rubbermaid who in turn had acquired it from Corning in the 1990s.

Click here for some Pyrex products.

Pioneer

Pioneer Corporation is a multinational corporation that specializes in digital entertainment products, based in Tokyo, Japan. The company was founded in 1938 in Tokyo as a radio and speaker repair shop. Today, Pioneer is well-known for technology advancements in the consumer electronics industry.

Pioneer played a role in the development of interactive cable TV, the Laser Disc player, the first automotive Compact Disc player, the first detachable face car stereo, Supertuner technology, DVD and DVD recording, plasma display, and Organic LED display (OLED). The company works with optical disc and display technology and software products and is also a manufacturer. Sharp Corporation took a 14% stake in Pioneer in 2007.

On February 12, 2009, Pioneer announced it plans to cease manufacture of television sets by March 2010. On June 25, 2009, Sharp Corporation agreed to form a joint venture on their optical business to be called "Pioneer Digital Design and Manufacturing Corporation".

Click here for some Pioneer products.

Panasonic

Panasonic Corporation, is a Japanese multinational corporation headquartered in Kadoma, Osaka, Japan. Its main business is in electronics manufacturing and it produces products under a variety of names including Panasonic and Technics.
Since its founding in 1918, it grew to become the largest Japanese electronics producer. In addition to electronics, Panasonic offers non-electronic products and services such as home renovation services. Panasonic was ranked the 89th-largest company in the world in 2009 by the Forbes Global 2000 and is among the Worldwide Top 20 Semiconductor Sales Leaders.

In 1927, the company founder adopted a brand name "National"for a new lamp product, knowing "national" meant "of or relating to a people, a nation." In 1955, the company labeled its export audio speakers and lamps "PanaSonic", which was the first time it used its "Panasonic" brand name.

In May 2003, the company put "Panasonic" as its global brand, and set its global brand slogan, "Panasonic ideas for life." The company began to unify its brands to "Panasonic" and, by March 2004 replaced "National" for products and outdoor signboards, except for those in Japan.
On January 10, 2008, the company announced that it would change its name to "Panasonic Corporation" (effective on October 1, 2008) and unify "National" in Japan to its global brand "Panasonic" (by March 2010). The name change was approved at a shareholders' meeting on June 26, 2008.

Panasonic was founded in 1918 by Konosuke Matsushita first selling duplex lamp sockets.
In 1961, Konosuke Matsushita traveled to the United States and met with American dealers. Panasonic began producing television sets for the U.S. market under the Panasonic brand name, and expanded the use of the brand to Europe in 1979.

The company used the National trademark outside of North America during the 1950s through the 1970s. It sold televisions, radios, and home appliances in some markets. The company began opening manufacturing plants around the world. It quickly developed a reputation for well-made reliable products.

The company debuted a hi-fidelity audio speaker in Japan in 1965 with the brand Technics. This line of high quality stereo components became worldwide favorites. The most famous product still made today is the SL-1200 record player, known for its high performance, precision, and durability. Throughout the 1970s and early 1980s, Panasonic continued to produce high-quality specialized electronics for niche markets, such as short-wave radios, and developed a successful line of stereo receivers, CD players, and other components

In November 1999, the Japan Times reported that Panasonic planned to develop a "next generation first aid kit" called the Electronic Health Checker. At the time, the target market was said to be elderly people, especially those living in rural areas where medical help might not be immediately available, so it was planned that the kit would include support for telemedicine. The kits were then in the testing stage, with plans for eventual overseas distribution, to include the United States.

In recent years the company has been involved with the development of high-density optical disc standards intended to eventually replace the DVD and the SD memory card.
On January 19, 2006 Panasonic announced that, starting in February, it will stop producing analog televisions (then 30% of its total TV business) to concentrate on digital TVs.

On November 3, 2008 Panasonic and Sanyo were in talks, resulting in the eventual acquisition of Sanyo. The merger is to be completed by September 2009, and will result in one mega-corporation with revenues over ¥11.2 trillion (around $110 billion). As part of what will be Japan's biggest electronics company, the Sanyo brand and most of the employees will be retained as a subsidiary

Click here for some Panasonic Products.

Sunbeam

Sunbeam Products is an American brand that has produced electric home appliances since 1910. Their products have included the Mixmaster mixer, the Sunbeam CG waffle iron, Coffeemaster (1938–1964) and the fully-automatic T20 toaster

Sunbeam bought out the Rain King Sprinkler Company and produced one of the most popular sprinkler lines of the 1950s and 1960s. Meanwhile, Sunbeam continued to expand outside of Chicago. By the end of the 1970s, as the leading American manufacturer of small appliances, Sunbeam enjoyed about $1.3 billion in annual sales and employed nearly 30,000 people worldwide. In 1981, after Sunbeam was bought by Allegheny International Inc. of Pittsburgh, its Chicago-area factories were closed and the headquarters moved from the Chicago region

Sunbeam went into decline through the 1990s and professional downsizer Albert J. Dunlap was recruited to turn the company around in 1996. In 1996 and 1997, Sunbeam reported massive increases in sales for its various backyard and kitchen items, but the sudden surge in demand for barbecues didn't hold up under scrutiny. An internal investigation revealed that Sunbeam was actually in severe crisis, and that Dunlap had encouraged violations of accepted accounting rules. Dunlap was fired, and under CEO Jerry W. Levin the company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2001

Soon after Sunbeam filed for bankruptcy, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) sued Dunlap and four other Sunbeam executives, alleging that they had engineered a massive accounting fraud. The SEC said $60 million of Sunbeam's supposed record $189 million earnings for 1997 were the result of fraudulent accounting. It also said that Dunlap had falsely created the impression of massive losses in 1996 to make it look like Sunbeam had made a dramatic turnaround the next year. Along with Dunlap and several other officers, the SEC also sued Phillip Harlow, at Sunbeam's accounting firm, Arthur Andersen. Dunlap was ultimately banned from ever serving as an officer or director of a public company again.

In 2002, Sunbeam emerged from bankruptcy as American Household, Inc. (AHI), a privately-held company. Its former household products division became the subsidiary Sunbeam Products, Inc.
AHI was purchased in September 2004 by the Jarden Corporation, of which it is now a subsidiary.

Click here for some Oster/Sunbeam products.

Mr. Coffee

Mr. Coffee is an automatic-drip kitchen coffee machine that was popular in the 1970s and 1980s. Its advertising spokesman was former baseball player Joe DiMaggio. The device was invented by Edward Able.

Introduced in 1972, Mr. Coffee was the first drip coffee maker made available for home use. Prior to the introduction of Mr. Coffee, most coffee prepared at home was made by a percolator, either on a stovetop or plugged directly into a wall socket. Percolators allowed brewed coffee to come into direct contact with heat, resulting in an inferior, burned beverage.

In 1995, a variation was produced by the same company for tea called "Mrs. Tea". The machine differed from Mr. Coffee only in detail as the drip process works equally well for tea as for coffee, although the result is often a darker, samovar type of tea.

Click here for Mr. Coffee machine.

Maytag

Maytag Corporation was a $4.7 billion home and commercial appliance company, headquartered in Newton, Iowa from 1893 to 2006, and now part of the Whirpool Corporation.
The Maytag Washing Machine Company was founded in 1893 by businessman Frederick Maytag. In 1925, the Maytag Washing Machine Company became Maytag, Inc. During the Great Depression of the 1930s, the company was one of the few to actually make a profit in successive years. At his father's death in 1940, Fred Maytag II, grandson of the founder, took over the presidency. During World War II, the company participated in war production by making special components for military equipment. In 1946, production of washing machines was resumed; in 1949, the first automatic washers were produced in a new purpose-built plant. In 1946, Maytag began marketing a separate line of ranges and refrigerators made by other companies under the Maytag name. During the Korean War, the company again produced parts for military equipment, although washing-machine production continued. During the 1950s, the 'white goods,' or laundry appliance industry grew rapidly. Maytag first entered the commercial laundry field at this time, manufacturing washers and dryers for commercial self-service laundries and commercial operators. In response, other full-line appliance producers began to compete with Maytag in the white-goods consumer market. These included 'full-line' manufacturers such as General Electric, Whirlpool, and Frigidaire, who built not only washing machines and dryers, but also refrigerators, stoves, and other appliances. Since Maytag was much smaller than the full-line producers, the company decided to limit itself to the manufacture of washers and dryers, alongside ovens and refrigerators built by other companies, as a niche-market, premium-brand manufacturer. The company capitalized on its reputation by renaming its corporate address in Newton, Iowa, "One Dependability Square."

By 1960, Maytag had ceased marketing ovens and refrigerators, but later began once again to expand into kitchen appliances with its own design of portable kitchen dishwasher and a line of food-waste disposers. Upon the death of Fred Maytag II, the last family member involved in the company's management, E. G. Higdon was named president of the company, with George M. Umbreit becoming chairman and CEO. By the late 1970s, over 70 percent of U.S. households were equipped with washers and dryers, and with approximately 18,000 employees worldwide, the company was established as a dominant manufacturer of large laundry appliances. After the company's acquisition of Magic Chef, Inc., in 1986, a move which nearly doubled its size, the company acquired a new corporate name, the Maytag Corporation.

On April 1, 2006, the Whirpool Corp. completed its acquisition of Maytag Corporation. In May 2006, Whirlpool announced plans to close the former Maytag headquarters office in Newton, as well as laundry manufacturing plants in Newton, Iowa; Herrin, Illinois; and Searcy, Arkansas, by 2007. Following the Maytag closure, all administration will be in Whirlpool's headquarters in Benton Harbor, Michigan. The Maytag name will still be used on rebranded Whirlpool appliances. Most Maytag employees were terminated, and some were offered jobs in Benton Harbor. The board of directors of Maytag all received five years' severance pay. Former chairman and CEO, Ralph F. Hake, received two years' base salary and two years' target bonus under his severance agreement.

Click here for some Maytag products.