Raytheon Manufacturing Co
of Newton, Massachusetts, U.S.A.
1922 The American Appliance Company was founded in Cambridge, Mass., by Vannevar Bush (later dean of MIT's School of Engineering), Laurence Marshall, an engineer, and Charles G. Smith, a scientist who had done work on the electrical properties of gases.
Their revolutionary innovation was the S-gas rectifier tube, a device that eliminated the need for the cumbersome expensive batteries that previously powered home radios.
WWII Faced with a need to produce valves for radar sets, a meeting was arranged at the suggestion of MIT’s Radiation Laboratory, between British scientists and Raytheon engineer Percy L. Spencer. As a result the UK awarded, through the Radiation Laboratory, a contract to Raytheon to supply the magnetrons. This brought together Raytheon with the A. C. Cossor company in the U.K.
Raytheon supplied 80 percent of the magnetron tubes used in U.S. and British radars and developed parts for the crucial proximity fuse in anti-aircraft shells, among other equipment.
Post-WWII Raytheon began offering civilian products, such as the microwave oven.
1950s and 60s Raytheon was a leading developer and supplier of guided missiles. Also provided the Apollo Guidance Computer that enabled the moon landings to be made.
1961 Raytheon acquired the A. C. Cossor company.
1997 Acquired Hughes Defence and Texas Instruments Defence; change of name to Raytheon Systems Limited