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Forum 141

Tesla Electronics (Soviet Era State Run Electronics Group in Czechia)

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Forum 142
(@Anonymous)
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Please forgive the immediate confusion, for those of us in California the name 'Tesla' is associated with electric cars. Built in the former New United Motor Manufacturing, Inc. (NUMMI) was an automobile manufacturing company in Fremont, California, jointly owned by General Motors and Toyota that opened in 1984 and closed in 2010.

TESLA (originally named after Nikola Tesla, later explained as abbreviation from "TEchnika SLAboproudá", which means "low-current technics") was a large, state-owned electrotechnical conglomerate in the former Czechoslovakia.

State-owned means "Soviet Controlled" with no competitors. Their products were sold through Czechoslovakia, and exported. I wonder how many radios and TVs were exported to the UK?

To produce at this volume required many different subsidiary companies, named for the town or region where they were built. Think of RCA, BRC/Thorn/Thorn-EMI, and General Electric (in the UK).

  • Tesla Karlin, Vrsovice and Strašnice (TV and broadcast industries)
  • Tesla Holesovice Hloubětín (bulbs)
  • Tesla Liberec (recorders, equipment fire alarm)
  • Tesla Kolin (radio),
  • Tesla Hradec Kralove (components)
  • Tesla Pardubice (tape recorders and transmission equipment)
  • Tesla Prelouc (tape)
  • Tesla Lanskroun (capacitors and transistors)
  • Tesla Vrchlabi (vacuum tubes, LED)
  • Tesla Jihlava (car components)
  • Tesla Brno (exchanges and amplifiers)
  • Tesla Litovel (record players, remote controls)
  • Tesla Roznov (vacuum tubes, integrated circuits, televisions)
  • Tesla Valasske Mezirici (speakers),
  • Tesla Blansko (meters)
  • Tesla Bratislava (radio)
  • Tesla Orava (TV)
  • Tesla Stropkov (phones and PBX)

The former site in Rožnov pod Radhoštěm, Czechia, was split up after the 1968 Velvet Revolution (Czech: sametová revoluce) or Gentle Revolution (Slovak: nežná revolúcia) was a non-violent transition of power in what was then Czechoslovakia.

Today the former Tesla semiconductor wafer fab was sold to Motorola, later to be spun off as ON Semiconductor.

The adjacent site was further split up and part of it become Philips Semiconductors and after 2006, NXP Semiconductors. Former TV set production was done on the same site, which seems to be occupied by smaller companies, not in high tech.

I'm typing this from inside NXP's building. Our 1.6km walk to the hotel in the town (population about 16k) takes us past former Soviet apartment block housing, a train station, and good views of a huge brick smoke stack, presumably the power station for the Tesla works. Much of the housing in walking distance is of various Soviet design, I'm not sure of the age, and it was probably built in stages. As Tesla declined so did the local workforce.

We have typical English weather this week, and I'm hoping for a break in the overcast to explore across the street.

As you might expect this was a big thrill for me to come here on a business trip and find an abandoned BW telly plant!!

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Posted : 10/03/2017 12:46 pm
Marc
 Marc
(@marc)
Posts: 2753
Noble Member Registered
 

Very interesting and kind of eerie looking at those photos. hmm_gif

Marc. 

Marc
BVWS member
RSGB call sign 2E0VTN

 
Posted : 10/03/2017 1:14 pm
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