Talk:Standard Telephones and Cables

Comments on Decline and Fall

I don't agree with the statement that "Nortel's take over was an asset stripping exercice". (or if this is the case then you need more justficiation, but this is not my view on it).

Nortel was making products for the North American market, whilst STC was making products for the British (and a few other countries). So it was a good match and the road to globalisation (though differing telecoms standards don't help).

I do think that STC had the same problem that many British companies have and this is a level playing field. For instance, British companies will buy from any company. Yet overseas companies will not buy British, but only from their local company.

Market de-regulation did help and open up the market.

STC did not just STOP existing, the products did continue just under the Nortel badge.

As for asset stripping - for instance the New Southgate, London NW11. The site was massive (I read that at one time it had 40 buildings during the war). They could have sold that land off and re-located people to some far off place. But they kept investing....

The de-regulation of telecoms was a great boon.

I am not sure if I agree

Nortel did invest in the UK. Plus they continue to invest in the pension plan for STC pensioners etc... (they did not need to do that).

In some ways STC sowed the seeds for its own destruction. The research in optical fibre changed the world. The massive machinery requiring skilled workers (the 'ageing workforce' of the article) for copper cabling was no longer needed. So the big North Woolwich factory was lost as production was rationalised in Newport. But did STC really ever switch from a heavy engineering firm making massive cabledrums of copper cable to oner making a much higher quality product that could be carried in reels by one man ? Like so much British industry, perhaps it just failed to adapt quickly enough. Haxbyct 14:42, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't believe that the statement "An attempt to enter the mainframe computer market with a failing player, ICL, led to financial strains." is fair or accurate. As the preceding paragraph says, the deal was sold on the perceived convergence of computing and telecoms, not on STC selling mainframes. As I recall, this was in the middle of a 10-year run of profitablilty for ICL, unique amongst mainframe manufacturers worldwide at this time. The Wikipedia article on ICL states "Within a few years ICL was contributing 60% of the profits and turnover of the combined [STC] group". Remember that at one point IBM posted an annual loss greater than ICL's whole turnover. Was IBM a failing player? Whether the merger was good for either party is another matter. I've always assumed that ICL gained optical technology (notably the optical bus used to link mainframe nodes) from STC, and in this respect ICL was said to be 5 years ahead of IBM. Pterre (talk) 12:34, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Salesman

As an engineer, one thing that was noted is that the saleman would sign up customers, without talking to the the engineering department. Basic questions is this deliverable? Does it make sense to chase this customer?. On one product, there were only 3 customers and they all wanted different things. So it was a custom job. But if there is no market beyond 3 customers - is it worth it?. It would be fine, if all 3 customers wanted the same product.

Also, on another case, heard about a salesman who claimed to have signed a customer up, only to find they did not have a contract. The project was canned.