Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V. (Royal Philips Electronics), more commonly known as Philips, (Euronext: PHIA, NYSE: PHG) is a multinational Dutch electronics company.

The Philips Company was founded in 1891 by Gerard Philips and his father Frederik as a family business. Frederik Philips, being a banker in Zaltbommel, financed the purchase and setup of a modest, empty factory building in Eindhoven, where Philips started the production of carbon-filament lamps and other electro-technical products in 1892. This first factory has been adapted and is used as a Museum devoted to light sculpture.

In 1895, after the first difficult years and near bankruptcy, the Philipses brought in Anton, Gerard's younger brother by sixteen years. Though he had earned a degree in engineering, Anton started work as a sales representative; soon, however, he began to contribute many important business ideas. After Anton's arrival, the family business began to expand rapidly, resulting in the foundation in 1907 of the N.V. Philips’ Metaalgloeilampfabriek (the Philips Lightwire-bulb Factory Inc) in Eindhoven, followed in 1912 by the foundation of the N.V. Philips' Gloeilampenfabrieken. (the Philips Light-bulbs Factories Inc). After Gerard and Anton Philips changed their family business by founding the Philips Incorporation, they laid the base of the later electronics multinational.

In the 1920s, the company started to manufacture other products, such as vacuum tubes. In 1939 they introduced their electric razor, the Philishave (marketed in the USA using the Norelco brand name). Philips was also instrumental in the revival of the Stirling engine.

Philips Radio

On 11 March 1927 Philips went on the air with shortwave radio station PCJJ (later PCJ) which was joined in 1929 by sister station PHI. PHI broadcast in Dutch to the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia) while PCJJ broadcast in English, Spanish and German to the rest of the world. The international program on Sundays commenced in 1928, with host Eddie Startz hosting the Happy Station show, which became the world's longest-running shortwave program. Broadcasts from the Netherlands were interrupted by the German invasion in May 1940. The Germans commandeered the transmitters in Huizen to use for pro-Nazi broadcasts, some originating from Germany, others concerts from Dutch broadcasters under German control. Philips Radio did not resume after Liberation. Instead' the two shortwave stations were nationalised in 1946 and renamed as Radio Netherlands Worldwide, the Dutch International Service. Some PCJ programs, such as Happy Station, continued on the new station.

World War II

On 9 May 1940, the Philips directors learned that the German invasion of the Netherlands was to take place the following day. Having prepared for this, Anton Philips and his son in law Frans Otten, as well as other Philips family members, fled to the United States, taking a large amount of the company capital with them. Operating from the US as the North American Philips Company, they managed to run the company throughout the war. At the same time, the company was moved (on paper) to the Netherlands Antilles to keep it out of American hands.

Frits Philips, the son of Anton, was the only Philips family member to stay in the Netherlands. He saved the lives of 382 Jews by convincing the Nazis that they were indispensable for the production process at Philips. In 1943 he was held at the internment camp for political prisoners at Vught for several months because a strike at his factory reduced production. For his actions in saving the hundreds of Jews, he was recognized by Yad Vashem in 1995 as a "Righteous Among the Nations"

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