As a chip maker, Philips Semiconductors was among the
Worldwide Top 20 Semiconductor Sales Leaders.
In December 2005 Philips announced its intention to make the Semiconductor Division into a separate legal entity. This process of "disentanglement" was completed on 1 October 2006.
On 2 August 2006, Philips completed an agreement to sell a controlling 80.1% stake in Philips Semiconductors to a consortium of private equity investors consisting of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. (KKR), Silver Lake Partners and AlpInvest Partners. The sale completed a process, which began December 2005, with its decision to create a separate legal entity for Semiconductors and to pursue all strategic options. Six weeks before, ahead of its online dialogue, through a letter to 8,000 of Philips managers, it was announced that they were speeding up the transformation of Semiconductors into a stand-alone entity with majority ownership by a third party. It was stated then that "this is much more than just a transaction: it is probably the most significant milestone on a long journey of change for Philips and the beginning of a new chapter for everyone – especially those involved with Semiconductors".
In its more than 115 year history, this counts as a big step that is definitely changing the profile of the company. Philips was one of few companies that successfully made the transition from the electrical world of the 19th century into the electronic age, starting its semiconductor activity in 1953 and building it into a global top 10 player in its industry. As such, Semiconductors was at the heart of many innovations in Philips over the past 50 years.
Agreeing to start a process that would ultimately lead to the decision to sell the Semiconductor Division therefore was one of the toughest decisions that the Board of Management ever had to make.
On 21 August 2006, Bain Capital and Apax Partners announced that they had signed definitive commitments to join the expanded consortium headed by KKR that is to acquire the controlling stake in the Semiconductors Division.
On 1 September 2006, it was announced in Berlin that the name of the new semiconductor company founded by Philips is NXP Semiconductors.
Corporate affairs
In 2004, Philips abandoned the slogan "Let's make things better" in favour of a new one: "Sense and simplicity".
ASM Lithography is a spin-off from a division of Philips.
Origin, now part of Atos Origin, is a former division of Philips.
Its record division, PolyGram, was sold to Seagram in 1998 and was merged into Universal Music Group. Philips Records continues to operate as part of UMG, its name licenced from its former parent.
Philips Intellectual Property and Standards, is the company's division dealing with licensing, trademark protection and patenting. Philips currently holds about 55,000 patent rights, 33,000 trademark registrations, and 49,000 design registrations.
CEOs
Past and present
CEOs:
1891–1922: Gerard Philips
1922–1939: Anton Philips
1939–1961: Frans Otten
1961–1971: Frits Philips
1971–1977: Henk van Riemsdijk
1977–1981: Nico Rodenburg
1982–1986: Wisse Dekker
1986–1990: Cornelis Van der Klugt
1990–1996: Jan Timmer
1996–2001: Cor Boonstra
2001–2011: Gerard Kleisterlee
2011-: Frans van Houten
Acquisitions, subsidiaries and spinouts
Acquisitions
Companies acquired by Philips through the years include
Amperex,
Magnavox,
Signetics,
Mullard,
VLSI,
Agilent Healthcare Solutions Group, Marconi Medical Systems,
ADAC Laboratories,
ATL Ultrasound, portions of
Westinghouse and the consumer electronics operations of
Philco and
Sylvania. Philips abandoned the Sylvania trademark which is now owned by
Havells Sylvania except in Australia, Canada, Mexico, New Zealand, Puerto Rico and the USA where it is owned by the
Osram unit of
Siemens. Formed in November 1999 as a equal joint venture between Philips and
Agilent Technologies, the
light-emitting diode manufacturer
Lumileds became a subsidiary of Phillips Lighting in August 2005 and a fully-owned subsidiary in December 2006. In 2000, Philips bought Optiva Corporation, the maker of
Sonicare electric toothbrushes. The company was renamed Philips Oral Healthcare and made a subsidiary of Philips DAP. In 2006 Philips bought out the company
Lifeline Systems headquartered in
Framingham,
Massachusetts. In August 2007 Philips acquired the company
Ximis, Inc. headquartered in
El Paso, Texas for their Medical Informatics Division.
In October 2007, it purchased a Moore Microprocessor Patent (MPP) Portfolio license from The TPL Group.
On Friday, 21 December 2007 Philips and Respironics, Inc. announced a definitive merger agreement pursuant to which Philips will commence a tender offer to acquire all of the outstanding shares of Respironics for US$66 per share, or a total purchase price of approximately €3.6 billion (US$5.1 billion) to be paid in cash upon completion.
On February 21, 2008 Philips had completed its acquisition of VISICU Baltimore, Maryland through the merger of its indirect wholly owned subsidiary into VISICU. As a result of that merger, VISICU has become an indirect wholly owned subsidiary of Philips. VISICU was the creator of the eICU concept of the use of Telemedicine from a centralized facility to monitor and care for ICU patients.
Spinouts
Polymer Vision, the maker of The Readius, is a
spin out from Philips Electronics. In May 2011, Polymer Vision designed and manufactured a 6-inch screen that displays black and white e-ink text and images at 800×600 pixels and can roll around a tube the circumference of a dime.
APRICO Solutions is a venture within Philips Intellectual Property and Standards.
Philips also forayed into the pharmaceuticals market in a company best known as Philips-Duphar (Dutch Pharmaceuticals). Philips-Duphar made products for crop protection, veterinary medicine and products for human use. Duphar was sold to Solvay, now Solvay Pharmaceuticals. In subsequent years divisions have been sold of, by Solvay, to other companies (crop protection was sold to UniRoyal, now Chemtura and the veterinary division was sold to Fort Dodge, a division of Wyeth).
Philips also acquired Dynalite, an Australia based lighting control company in 2009, in order to provide its customer a complete lighting solution.
Sports, sponsorships and naming rights
Traditionally Philips has a vested interest in sports, originally as a means to provide a healthy form of recreation for its employees. In 1913, in celebration of the Centenary of Dutch independence from France, Philips founded a sports club called
Philips Sport Vereniging (Philips Sports Club), or PSV, as it is now known. The sports club
encompasses all kinds of sports, but is currently most famous for its Premier League football team and its swimming team. Philips owns the naming rights to
Philips Stadion, located in
Eindhoven, which is home to Dutch football team
PSV Eindhoven.
Abroad, Philips sponsors and has sponsored numerous sport clubs, sport facilities, and events. Philips recently (November 2008) extended its very successful F1 partnership with AT&T; Williams to include many more product groups.
Furthermore, Philips owns the naming rights to the Philips Arena in Atlanta, Georgia and to the Philips Championship, the premier basketball league in Australia, traditionally known as the National Basketball League. Between 1988 and 1993 Philips were also the major sponsors of The Balmain Tigers, an Australian rugby league team.
Outside of sports Philips sponsors the Philips Monsters of Rock festival, held in many countries all over the world.
Worldwide presence
Philips also used to sell major household appliances (
whitegoods) under the name
Philips. After selling the Major Domestic Appliances division to
Whirlpool Corporation it changed via
Philips Whirlpool and
Whirlpool Philips to
Whirlpool only. Whirlpool bought a 53% stake in Philips' major appliance operations to form Whirlpool International. Whirlpool bought Philips' remaining interest in Whirlpool International in 1991.
Philips is a member of the Hybrid Broadcast Broadband TV (HbbTV) consortium of broadcasting and Internet industry companies (also including SES Astra, Humax, OpenTV and ANT Software) that is promoting and establishing an open European standard (called HbbTV) for hybrid set-top boxes for the reception of broadcast TV and broadband multimedia applications with a single user interface.
Australia
Philips
Australia was founded in 1927 and has been involved in many activities over the years, especially manufacturing. Philips Australia has its headquarters in
North Ryde, New South Wales. The company employs over 400 people nationwide.
Regional sales and support offices are located in Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. IT infrastructure Services are provided by IBM under the APAC regional River contract and managed by Philips ITI.
Current operating sectors/activities include;
Philips Healthcare (also responsible for New Zealand operations)
Philips Lighting (also responsible for New Zealand operations)
Philips Consumer Lifestyle (also responsible for New Zealand operations)
Philips Dictation Systems
Philips Dynalite (Lighting Control systems, acquired in 2009)
Philips Lumileds (Lumiled-LED lights, used in cellphones as a camera flash. One example is the Sony Ericsson W995 flash.)
As of 2009 philips removed the majority of its AV products from Australia. It is now only a small appliance reseller. These products are sold by a distributor.
Brazil
Philips do Brasil was founded in 1924
Rio de Janeiro. In 1929, Philips started to sell radio receivers. In the 1930s, Philips was making its light bulbs and radio receivers in Brazil. From 1939 to 1945, World War II forced Brazilian branch of Philips to sell
bicycles,
refrigerators and
insecticides. After the war, Philips had a great industrial expansion in Brazil,and was among first groups to establish in
Manaus Free Zone. In the 1970s, Philips Records was a major player in Brazil recording industry. Nowadays, Philips do Brasil is one of the largest foreign-owned companies in Brazil.
Canada
Philips Canada was founded in 1934. It is well known in medical systems for diagnosis and therapy, lighting technologies, shavers, and consumer electronics.
The Canadian headquarters are located in Markham, Ontario.
For several years, Philips manufactured lighting products in two Canadian factories. The Windsor, Ontario, plant opened in 1971. It produced A19 lamps (including the "Royale" long life bulbs), PAR38 lamps and T19 lamps (originally a Westinghouse lamp shape). Philips closed the factory in May, 2003. The Trois-Rivières, Quebec plant was a Westinghouse facility which Philips continued to run it after buying Westinghouse's lamp division in 1983. Philips closed this factory a few years later, in the late 1980s.
China, People's Republic of
In early 2008 Philips Lighting, a division of Royal Philips Electronics, opened a small engineering center to adapt the company's products to vehicles in Asia.
Hong Kong
Philips Hong Kong began operation in 1948. Philips Hong Kong houses the global headquarter of Philips' Audio Business Unit. It also house Philip's
Asia Pacific regional office and headquarters for its Design Division, Domestic Appliances & Personal Care Products Division, Lighting Products Division and Medical System Products Division.
Philips also has a Light Factory in Hong Kong, with 11 automatic production lines installed which is capable of producing 200 million pieces a year. The Philips Light Factory was established in 1974, now certified with ISO9001:2000 & ISO14001, its product portfolio ranges from Prefocus, Lensend to E10 miniature light bulbs.
In 2008, Philips India entered a new product category, water purifiers designed and made in India, and exported to other countries.
As of 2008, Philips India has about 4,000 employees.
Israel
Philips has been active in
Israel since 1948 and in 1998 set-up a wholly owned subsidiary, Philips Electronics (Israel) Ltd. The company has 600 employees in Israel and generated sales of over $300 million in 2007.
Philips Medical Systems Technologies Ltd. (Haifa) is a developer and manufacturer of Computerized Tomography (CT), diagnostic and Medical Imaging systems. The company was founded in 1969 as Elscint by Elron Electronic Industries and was acquired by Marconi Medical Systems in 1998, which was itself acquired by Philips in 2001.
Philips Semiconductors Israel, now part of NXP Semiconductors
Mexico
Philips Mexicana SA de CV corporate office is based in Mexico City.
There are several manufacturing plants in Mexico. Some of them are:
Philips Lighting in:
Monterrey, Nuevo León
Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua
Tijuana, Baja California
Philips Consumer Electronics in:
Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua
Philips Domestic Appliances used to be manufactured in a large factory in Industrial Vallejo sector of Mexico City but was closed in 2003–2004.
Poland
European financial and accounting centre: Łódź
Philips Lighting: Bielsko-Biała, Pabianice, Piła,Ketrzyn,
Philips Domestic Appliances: Białystok
United Kingdom
Philips UK has its
headquarters in
Guildford,
Surrey. The company employs over 2500 people nationwide.
Philips Applied Technology, Redhill, Surrey develops new products and sub-systems including digital TV and communication technologies.
Philips Healthcare Informatics, Belfast develops healthcare software products.
Philips Business Communications, Cambridge offers voice and data communications products, specialising in Customer Relationship Management (CRM) applications, IP Telephony, data networking, voice processing, command and control systems and cordless and mobile telephony. In 2006 the business was placed into a 60/40 joint venture with NEC. As of 2010 this business now forms part of NEC Unified Solutions with headquarters in Hilversum, The Netherlands. Now 100% owned subsidiary of NEC Corporation of Japan.
Philips Consumer Products, Guildford provides sales and marketing for televisions, including High Definition televisions, DVD recorders, hi-fi and portable audio, CD recorders, PC peripherals, cordless telephones, home and kitchen appliances, personal care (shavers, hair dryers, body beauty and oral hygiene ).
Philips Dictation Systems, Colchester, Essex.
Philips Lighting: sales from Guildford and manufacture in Hamilton, Lanarkshire.
Philips Healthcare, Reigate, Surrey. Sales and technical support for X-ray, ultrasound, nuclear medicine, patient monitoring, magnetic resonance, computed tomography, and resuscitation products.
Philips Research Laboratories, Cambridge (Until 2008 based in Redhill, Surrey. Originally these were the Mullard Research Laboratories.)
Philips Semiconductors, Hazel Grove, Stockport, Greater Manchester and Southampton, Hampshire, both also earlier part of Mullard. These now become part of NXP.
In the past, Philips UK also included
Consumer product manufacturing in Croydon
Philips Domestic Appliances: Electric kettles production at Hastings
London Carriers, logistics and transport division.
Mullard Equipment Limited (MEL) which produced products for the military
Pye Telecommunications Ltd of Cambridge
TMC Limited of Malmesbury, Wiltshire
United States
Philips' American headquarters is Philips Electronics North America Corporation, 3000 Minuteman Rd., Andover, Massachusetts. For many years, the North American headquarters was located in New York, but with the company's footprint in healthcare ever increasing, it made sense to co-locate its headquarters office with its largest business sector (healthcare).
Philips Lighting has its corporate office in Somerset, New Jersey
with manufacturing plants in:
Danville, Kentucky
Bath, New York
Salina, Kansas
Paris, Texas
distribution centers in:
Mountain Top, Pennsylvania
Ontario, California
Memphis, Tennessee
Philips Healthcare is headquartered in Andover, Massachusetts. The North American sales organization is based in Bothell, Washington. There are also manufacturing facilities in:
Andover, Massachusetts
Bothell, Washington
Baltimore, Maryland
Cleveland, Ohio
Foster City, California
Milpitas, California
Reedsville, Pennsylvania
One factory in Knoxville, Tennessee has closed. (Need info.)
Philips Consumer Lifestyle has its corporate office in Stamford, Connecticut.
It has a manufacturing plant in Snoqualmie, Washington which makes Sonicare electric toothbrushes.
Philips Research has a laboratory in Briarcliff Manor, New York.
In 2007, Philips has entered into a definitive merger agreement with North American luminaires company Genlyte Group Incorporated, which provides the company with a leading position in the North American luminaires (also known as ˜lighting fixtures"), controls and related products for a wide variety of applications, including solid state lighting. The company also acquired Respironics, which was a significant gain for its healthcare sectore.
On February 21, 2008 Philips had completed its acquisition of VISICU Baltimore, Maryland through the merger of its indirect wholly owned subsidiary into VISICU. As a result of that merger, VISICU has become an indirect wholly owned subsidiary of Philips. VISICU was the creator of the eICU concept of the use of Telemedicine from a centralized facility to monitor and care for ICU patients.
Philips has received many awards for its design, innovation and business standards. It is considered by many as one of the world's leading innovators in technology, particularly for healthcare, lighting and consumer products.
Major consumer electronics products
1949 - began selling television sets. but was not a sales success .
1992 – launched the ill-fated Digital Compact Cassette format.
1995 – manufactured the Atari Jaguar's CD add-on for Atari.
1999 – launched the Super Audio CD in partnership with Sony.
2000 - launched the luminaire Iridium.
2001 – successfully launched the Senseo coffeemaker, first in the Netherlands and from 2002 onwards, in other countries across Europe. It produces coffee by brewing from custom-made pads containing coffee grounds. The original Senseo pads are produced by Douwe Egberts. The Senseo has been available in the US since 2004.
2004 – Philips HomeLabs research center created the Mirror TV technology used in their MiraVision television line.
2006 – introduced the Blu-ray Disc in partnership with Sony.
2008 – introduced flatscreen with WOW VX technology. (3D TV)
2008 – introduced the Relationship Care range of Philips Intimate Massagers to the UK market.
The company receives a royalty on every DVD manufactured.
2009 – introduced the in a widescreen mode for HDTVs with an LCD display using the aspect ratio.
Environmental record
![Philips MP1002CA Stirling generator of 195 Encouraged by their first experimental engine, which produced 16 W of shaft power from a bore and stroke of 30mm × 25mm,[43] Philips began a development program.](http://web.archive.org./web/20110824183928im_/http://cdn0.wn.com/pd/a2/5f/91b3d650237022580374329a8306_grande.jpg "Philips MP1002CA Stirling generator of 195 Encouraged by their first experimental engine, which produced 16 W of shaft power from a bore and stroke of 30mm × 25mm,[43] Philips began a development program.")
![Philips MP1002CA Stirling generator of 195 Encouraged by their first experimental engine, which produced 16 W of shaft power from a bore and stroke of 30mm × 25mm,[43] Philips began a development program.](http://web.archive.org./web/20110824183928im_/http://cdn9.wn.com/pd/a2/5f/91b3d650237022580374329a8306_thumb.jpg "Philips MP1002CA Stirling generator of 195 Encouraged by their first experimental engine, which produced 16 W of shaft power from a bore and stroke of 30mm × 25mm,[43] Philips began a development program.")
