MEM Celebrates its Centenary
The Midland Electric Manufacturing Company Ltd. began manufacturing switch and fusegear in a workshop behind a house in Conybere Street, Birmingham in 1908. Today it is part of the Eaton Corporation which has 81,000 employees worldwide. Switchgear and fusegear are still manufactured at the main UK factory in Reddings Lane, Birmingham, less than 3 miles from Conybere Street where it all began.
Eaton is marking the occasion with celebrations and special gifts for employees at the MEM sites in Birmingham, Holyhead and Middleton. A programme of special events is planned for employees, distributors and major customers. A display at Reddings Lane traces the 100-year history and various centenary publications are being produced to coincide with the month in which the company name was registered, September 1908.
MEM products span the whole spectrum of electrical installation equipment, from the main switchboard to the socket-outlet. They include industrial switchgear, busbar trunking, panelboards and distribution boards, lighting management systems, motor controlgear, domestic switchgear and wiring accessories. But circuit protection – fuses and circuit-breakers – has remained at the heart of the business since the earliest days.
The company name was registered in 1908 with a capital of just £800 and the ‘MEM’ trade mark was registered three years later. MEM became a public company in 1926. It remained independent until 1971 when it was acquired by Delta Metal which went on to acquire names like Nettle Accessories, Bill Switchgear, Home Automation and Holec. The Electrical Division of Delta was sold to its present owner, Eaton Corporation of Cleveland Ohio in January 2003. Since then Eaton has invested heavily in modernisation and rationalisation.
MEM was founded by a 28 year-old engineer, Walter L Barber, who saw the potential of the emerging electrical industry. Within a year the company had introduced a standardised range of ironclad switch and fusegear as an alternative to the expensive custom-built equipment of the day. This was followed by a radical new design of rewirable fuse that was less prone to pyrotechnic displays than other devices available at the time.
Walter Barber was a visionary who saw the benefits of standardising product design. In the 1920s, he began looking at the mass-production techniques employed by Henry Ford and others in America and introduced assembly-line production to MEM. From an early stage he pursued a policy of self-sufficiency, establishing the company’s own foundry, pottery, extrusion presses and facilities to produce springs and turned parts.
MEM has continued to be at the forefront of developments in circuit protection. It was one of the first companies to introduce HRC cartridge fuses in the post-war years. It introduced its first domestic consumer unit in 1955 and its first miniature circuit-breakers in 1965. Early MCBs were of European origin but in 1988 MEM announced the first all-British range of current-limiting MCBs designed and manufactured in Holyhead. 1996 saw the introduction of the revolutionary ‘pod’ RCBO with its modular construction. The Company still offers the MCB range; and the modular ‘pod’ RCBO is still a unique device.
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