General Radio

General Radio Corporation (later, GenRad) was a broad-line manufacturer of electronic test equipment. Started in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1915, the company moved to West Concord in the 1950s. There, it became a major player in the automatic test equipment (ATE) business, manufacturing a line of testers for assembled printed circuit boards. It also produced extensive lines of electrical component measuring equipment, sound and vibration measurement and RLC standards.

Primarily because of its line of ATE equipment, the company was eventually acquired by Teradyne in 2001 and has now been relocated to Teradyne's corporate campus in North Reading, Massachusetts.

The classic instrument line including RLC standards and decades, Digibridges, megohmmeters, stroboscopes, and sound level meters was acquired by IET Labs and continues to be manufactured and supported in West Roxbury, MA.

Among General Radio's accomplishments over the years have been:

* The introduction of one of the world's first portable oscilloscopes
* The production of many high-precision standards for resistance and capacitance
* The commercial production of the stroboscope as the "Strobotac"
* The commercial production of the sound level meter
* Commercial invention of the binding post.
* Invention of the GR connector
* The "Variac" variable autotransformer

External links

* http://www.teradyne.com -- Teradyne, the current owner of the GenRad ATE business
* http://www.ietlabs.com -- IET Labs, the current owner of the traditional GenRad instrument business