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Yashica Vashishtha

Yashica is a Software Engineer turned Content Writer, who loves to write on social causes and expertise in writing technical stuff. She loves to watch movies and explore new places. She believes that you need to live once before you die. So experimenting with her life and career choices, she is trying to live her life to the fullest.

Dormakaba

Dormakaba – One of the Biggest Global Access Control and Security Solutions Company.

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Dormakaba Holding AG started as two separate companies and have separate histories before 2015. Kaba and former Dorma merged in 2015 to form Dormakaba, a global security group offering services like identification, safe locks and lodging products.

Dormakaba is a global leader in the field of access security and has over 150 years of experience. The company is providing its services to almost every industry, including healthcare, hotel, education, shops, entertainment facilities, etc. Dormakaba headquarters is based in Rümlang, Switzerland, and over 15000 people are working for it. Dormakaba work in five different segments, i.e., Access Solutions AMER (North and South America), Access Solutions APAC (Asia Pacific), Access Solutions DACH (Germany, Austria, Switzerland),  Access Solutions EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Africa), Key and Wall Solutions.

The Growth History of Dormakaba

Dormakaba
Image source: www.mark-info.co.uk

Kaba started as a locksmith shop, which also worked as a cash register factory. Franz Bauer founded Kaba in Zurich in 1862, but in 1915, Leo Bodmer bought and renamed the company to Bauer AG. The first patent for the company after the acquisition was of the first cylinder lock made by inventor Fritz Schori. The lock was named after the founder of Kaba, i.e., ‘Kassenbauer’ (in German).

In the coming years, the company expanded from Zurich to the whole of Europe and listed on the Zurich stock exchange along with a name change to Kaba Holding AG in 1995. In 2001, the company started to expand overseas through some major acquisitions, Unican Security Systems of North America being one of them. The company also acquired a China-based company named  Wah Yuet Group, a US-based company Computerized Security Systems and a Dutch company  H. Cillekens Zn. B.V. in 2006. At the same time, Kaba also partnered with Minda Group of India.

The Growth Story of Dormakaba

On the other hand, Wilhelm Dörken and Rudolf Mankel founded Dorma as Dörken & Mankel KG in Ennepetal, Germany, in the year 1908. The company worked in the field of door technology. For the 50 years of its inception, the company was constantly working towards incorporating technology into the door systems, and in 1962, it built its first automatic door.

In the next fifteen years, the company also started to work on glass fittings. The company also started to expand and opened its first international office in Singapore in 1978. In the next ten years, Dorma brought Safety solutions and emergency exit control systems to its product range. In 1999, Dorma acquired a comapny named Groom and introduced mobile partition walls in 2002. In 2013, the company recorded 1 billion Euros in annual turnover.

The Merger

The two companies, Dorma and Kaba, both the leaders in their respective fields, decided to merge their operations to expand even more. The two companies came together on 30 April 2015 for the planning and sealed the deal in September of the same year.

The Product Range

Today, Dormakaba is among the top three security companies and is offering its services worldwide. Since the company is a result of a big merger, the company provides its services under multiple brand names, including Keyscan, Best, Dorma, Dorma, Dormakaba, lIco, Kaba, Kilargo, Legic, etc. Also, the areas of operation for the company includes door hardware, electronic access and data, entrance systems, mechanical key systems, safe locks, lodging systems, interior glass systems, movable walls, etc.

The CEO at Dormakaba

Sabrina Soussan is the CEO of Dormakaba. She is a French and German national. Soussan has a Master’s Degree in Mechanical and Aeronautical engineering from the E.N.S.M.A Aeronautical and Mechanical Engineering School, Poitiers (FR) and an MBA Degree from the Poitiers and Dublin University.

Soussan was appointed as the CEO of Dormakaba in January 2021. Before that, she served as the co-CEO at Siemens Mobility and worked at the company for eleven years in different positions. She also worked at companies like Renault for a few years. Soussan is also a member of the board of directors at ITT Inc. and Schaeffler.

Seagate Technology

Seagate Technology – The Biggest Contributor to the Growth of Computer Storage Industry.

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Computer storage is an essential part of computer hardware and software. Over time, computer storage has gone through a tremendous change, and we have seen these devices grow in technology and size. Today a small chip can hold data over 500 GB or more. And this has happened due to some innovative companies running behind the technology and working towards innovation. Seagate Technology is one such example of companies, working in the field of computer storage that has been actively providing innovative products to the industry.

Seagate Technology Holdings initially founded as Shugart Technology is an American data storage company manufacturing and distributing computer storage devices. It was founded about 40 years ago and has been working in the field of computer storage as a leader. The company is credited for ‘sparking the personal computer revolution’ with its 5.25-inch hard drive for the PCs.

 About Seagate Technology

Seagate is a result of a prediction of upcoming growth in the economic industry as microcomputers were becoming popular in the late 70s. The company, today, stands as the biggest supplier of the HDD market and competes with companies like Western Digital. Seagate has also added to its growth with some of its major acquisitions, including Conner Peripherals, Maxtor and Samsung’s HDD business.

Seagate has established its operational headquarters in California, US, and the legal domicile is in Dublin, Ireland. The company has seen rapid growth in its sales in the past twenty years. As per the 2020 records, the company made revenues worth US$10.51 billion, and over 42,000 people are working for it in the US and overseas.

Seagate Technology
Image Source: www.seagate.com

Founding Seagate Technology

Finis Conner and Alan Shugart founded Seagate Technology on 1 November 1979 as Shugart Technology. It was Conner who thought of the idea to start a hard disk drive manufacturing company to take advantage of the upcoming economic boom.  Later, Tom Mitchell, Doug Mahon and Syed Iftikar joined in to become the partners in the company. There was a company already existing with the name Shugart, so the founders had to change the name to Seagate Technology.

Seagate started as the manufacturers of hard disk drives for computers. In 1980, the company developed its first product, the 5-megabyte ST-506, the first 5.25-inch hard disk drive (HDD). Later, due to the huge popularity of the ST-506, Seagate also brought the 10-megabyte version of the same hard disk. Soon Seagate became the major supplier of the hard disk drives for microcomputers and bagged a contract for OEM for the IBM XT from IBM. IBM XT was the first personal computer that had a hard disk.

The Growth

By the early 80s, Seagate had got a hold on the 45% of the single-user hard drive market. At the beginning of the 90s, Seagate shifted its focus from external drives to mainframe drives, and it limited the outsourcing of components from other companies. Instead, it started to manufacture most of the components in its manufacturing units. During the same time, Seagate also introduced the industry’s first hard disk with a 7200-RPM spindle speed. The company was already trading on Nasdaq but moved to New York Stock Exchange in 1995.

In 1996, Seagate merged with Conner Peripheral, standing as the largest independent hard-drive manufacturer in the world. The same year, the company came with the first hard disk with a 10,000-RPM spindle speed in the industry, named Cheetah 4LP. Between 1997 and 2004, Seagate increased its production, supplying about 20 million drives per quarter.

In the year 2000, the company became a private company, but after a lot of restricting and relocation to the Cayman Islands, it became public in 2002. In 2003, Seagate started to manufacture hard disks for notebook computers as well as for the first iPods, smartphones and cameras. Seagate introduced the concept of hybrid drive in 2007, and the next year, it sold 1 billion HDDs.

In 2010, another restructuring for the company took place, and the company headquarter was moved to Cupertino, California. The company also changed the country of its incorporation to Ireland, with a name change to Seagate Technology plc. The same year, it brought the world’s first 3 TB hard drive. By 2012, the company value had raised to $14 billion and produced the first 1 TB/square inch density hard drive. The next year, Seagate was shipping the shingled magnetic recording drives, and in 2016, it demonstrated the 60 TB SSD, ‘largest ever.’

In 2020, the company’s operational headquarters was moved to Fremont, California. In May 2020, Seagate Technology Holdings plc became the parent company of Seagate, replacing Seagate Technology plc.

The Founder

Finis Conner is the founder of Seagate Technolgy. He was born on 28 July 1943 in Gadsden, Alabama. Because of his poor financial condition, Conner started to work at the age of 19 at IBM, and with time managed to get a degree in industrial management from San Jose State College in 1969. With his experience at IBM, Conner thought of the idea to build a company named Shugart Associates with Alan Shugart to manufacture floppy disks, becoming the pioneer in the industry. Later with Shugart, he founded Seagate Technology. Apart from that, Conner also founded Conner Peripherals, which later became a part of Seagate Technology.

United Microelectronics Corporation

United Microelectronics Corporation – Taiwan’s First Semiconductor Company.

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Taiwan is the manufacturing hub for most of the world’s biggest electronics and IT companies. Apart from providing land for manufacturing and labor for work, Taiwan has also given some big-name companies that are leaders of their respective fields. UMC, aka United Microelectronics Corporation, is one such Taiwanese company that has made its mark on the international level. In fact, it is the first semiconductor company in Taiwan.

UMC was founded in 1980, and its headquarter is based in Hsinchu Science Park Hsinchu, Taiwan. The founding of the company is a result of the spinning off of the government-sponsored organization, the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI).

About United Microelectronics Corporation

As said earlier UMC is a spin-off company of a state-owned institution. The company is the first semiconductor company in Taiwan, and it is known to manufacture integrated circuit wafers for other companies which produce fabless semiconductor. Though the company is based in Taiwan, it does most of its business outside the country, TSMC and GlobalFoundries being its major competitors and the automotive industry being its major area of service. The company operates through its four different fabs (300 mm), based in Japan, Taiwan, Singapore, and China, to provide better service to its customers.

United Microelectronics Corporation
Image Source: tradingview.com

UMC incorporates the latest technologies and innovative techniques to manufacture and process IC manufacturing. Logic/Mixed-Signal, embedded High-Voltage, embedded Non-Volatile-Memory, RFSOI, and BCD, etc., are some of the techniques used by the company. The company has over 12 fab productions and produces about 800,000 wafers every month.

UMC trades as a public company and has listed on New York Stock Exchange as well as Taiwan Stock Exchange. The company employs over 19,500 people worldwide, and as per 2019 records, the company made annual revenues worth US$5 billion.

The Founding and Growth

UMC became the first Taiwanese semiconductor company when it got spun off from the state-owned ITRI. It became the pioneer of the commercial semiconductor industry for Taiwan. In 1985, UMC listed on  Taiwan Stock Exchange. The company ran on the IDM model for about fifteen years from its inception, and then in 1995, the company switched to the pure-play foundry model and started to manufacture its own products.

The next year, UMC spun off multiple design units, resulting in the formation of AMIC Technology, MediaTek, ITE Technology,  Novatek, Faraday Technology, and Davicom. In 1999, the company established its first 12A, Taiwan’s first 12-inch wafer fab in Tainan Science Park. The next year, UMC became Taiwan’s first-ever semiconductor company to list on the New York Stock Exchange. The same year, the company started to manufacture the chips using copper process technology. It also brought the first 0.13-micron ICs to the industry.

In 2024, the Singapore-based wafer fab of the UMC started mass production, and in 2008, UMC listed some of its stocks on the Dow Jones Sustainability Index (DJSI). The company also made some acquisitions like Hejian Technology Wafer Fab of China in 2013 and  Japan-based Mie Fujitsu Semiconductor in 2019. In 2015, UMC entered China by establishing a 12-inch wafer fab in Xiamen, Fujian Province, China, where the company started the 28 nm mass production in 2017.

Stan Hung: The Chairman at UMC

Stan Hung is the Chairman of the Board and Chief Strategy Officer in United Microelectronics Corporation. He joined the company in 1991 and became the chairman in 2008. Hung is a native of Taiwan. He completed his school education from a local high school and earned a bachelor’s degree in accounting from Tamkang University, Taiwan.

Other than being the chairman of UMC, Hung also holds a prime position in some prominent companies. He has been appointed as the chairman of the board in Fortune Venture Capital Corp., TLC Capital Co., Ltd., and Faraday Technology Corporation. Hung also serves Triknight Capital Corporation and UnitedDS Semiconductor (Shandong) Co., Ltd. as the director.

ServiceNow

ServiceNow – One of the Fastest Growing Cloud-Computing Company

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Cloud computing has changed the face of the IT industry. It has increased the scope for software companies and the people seeking innovation. ServiceNow is one such company that saw the scope in cloud computing and decided to move forward to work in software-as-a-service. In fact, ServiceNow is known as one of the pioneers of software-as-a-service. The company came into being in 2003, and ever since, it has been growing towards its goal of clients’ satisfaction. Fred Luddy founded ServiceNow, and the company headquarter is located in Santa Clara, California.

ServiceNow, today, deals in platform-as-a-service operations like Cloud computing, technical management support, IT service management, and Enterprise Service Management and is currently serving over 6000 customers worldwide. The company has also started to incorporate artificial intelligence technology into its cloud computing service to yield more practical solutions. ServiceNow employs over 12000 people, and as of 2019, made revenues worth US$3,460,437,000.

Broke to Billionaire Story of ServiceNow

Fred Luddy, the founder of ServiceNow, has a real ‘rags to riches story and has also given us an example of “the age is just a number”. Luddy founded the company, after he went through a $35 million personal fortune loss, because of a fraud in his previous company, Peregrine Systems, around fourteen years ago. He was was the CTO at the company and lost his money due to accounting fraud.

But later, Luddy geared up and started to work on the next project, i.e. a cloud-based product (software-as-a-service) to ease out operations for the average office worker. Luddy founded the software company Glidesoft, Inc. in 2003, just before Luddy turned 50, discarding the psychological thing for people that 50 years is too late for starting a business. In 2004, the company name was changed to ServiceNow, and till 2005, the founder was working on software that the company was going to sell.

ServiceNow
Image Source: plat4mation.com

In 2005, ServiceNow hired its first five employees (Luddy’s brother Rob being one of them) and raised US$2.5 million in venture capital. Rob joined the company as the first sales representative, who took the product into the market, making first of the sales for the company.

In just two years after raising the money and going into the market, ServiceNow made revenues worth US$13 million. In 2007, the company moved to San Jose, Silicon Valley, and the company started to make profits. ServiceNow had a D series fundraising lead by Sequoia Capital in 2009, where it raised 41.4 million.

By 2011, ServiceNow had opened offices in places like San Diego, Chicago, New York, Atlanta, London and Frankfurt. The same year, it partnered with Accenture such that the former was offering consulting services to the latter through its hundred dedicated employees.

In 2012, ServiceNow had its first IPO, and the same year its headquarter was moved to Santa Clara, California. ServiceNow made revenues worth 1.39 billion in 2016 and reached the market cap of 12.34 billion. The company also ranked number 1 on the  Forbes Most Innovative Companies list in 2018, and in 2021, it was among the world’s most admired companies for the 2021 list of Fortune Magazine.

Acquisitions

In the year 2013, ServiceNow started to make acquisitions to encourage company growth. Mirror42 (2013), Neebula Systems (2014), Intréis (2015), Brightpoint Security (2016), DxContinuum (2017), VendorHawk (2018), Parlo (2018), Appsee Ltd. (2019), Loom Systems and Passage AI (2020), Attivio (2020), Element AI (2020), Intellibot (2021), and Lightstep (2021) are some of the names of its acquired companies.

The Founder: Fred Luddy

Fred Luddy, the founder of ServiceNow is known as one of the software-as-a-service pioneers. He is an American national and grew up in New Castle, Indiana. Luddy completed his high school at a local public school and has always been interested in computer programming. He joined Indiana University but left his studies in between to work more on his programming skills.

Before starting ServiceNow, he was working at Peregrine Systems as the CTO. But in 2003, due to accounting fraud, he lost money worth $35 million in the same company. After starting ServiceNow, he served the company as the CEO till 2011 and then started working an advisory role for ServiceNow till 2016.

Telus Communications

Telus Communications Inc. – The Largest Telecom and Internet Network in Canada

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Telus Communications Inc. is a Canada-based telecommunications company founded in 1990 in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. The company is the second-largest telecommunication company in Canada and offers its services on an international level as well. The company is a leading telecom company in Canada, making billions of revenues every year. As of 2020, Telus earned worth C$15.34 billion in revenues.

Telus Communications is among the top 100 best companies for employees, and as of 2019, over 65,000 people are working for it globally. Public Mobile, Alarmforce Canada, and Koodo Mobile are some of its major subsidiaries, providing services in the field of mobility, TV, internet/fiber, smart home security, healthcare, etc. Earlier, the company headquarters was in Alberta, which now has been moved to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

The Founding of Telus Communications

The government of Alberta founded Telus as Telus Corp in 1990. The company was founded to encourage the privatization of the government-owned Alberta Government Telephones (AGT). This service was the most used telephone service in Alberta, except in Edmonton. Telus Communications is among the top 100 best companies for employees, and as of 2019, over 65,000 people are working for it globally. was a holding company, and to expand its operations into Edmonton, Telus acquired Edmonton Telephones Corporation (EdTel) in 1995. The same year, the company established the consumer internet service, and the next year, it launched Canada’s first Internet Yellow page service, i.e., Alberta.com. By 1996, AGT and EdTel had become a part of Telus.

The year 1997, Telus received approval for running multimedia service trials in Edmonton and Calgary from the CRTC. In 1999, Telus had a merger with BC Tel resulting in another big expansion for Telus, making it the second-largest telephone service in Canada. The same year, Telus Corp was renamed Telus Communications.

Telus Communications
Image Source: en.wikipedia.org

Telus, in 2005, merged its mobility department, Telus Mobility, with Telus Communications, resulting in the integration of the wireline and wireless segments of the company.  In 2009, the company launched a 3G+ wireless network, becoming the largest 3G+ network in Canada. Telus Communications won the most outstanding philanthropic corporation with a global award in 2010.

Telus Health launched an electronic service (first of its kind in Canada) for people to track their health in 2010. The next year, Telus launched the 4G+ wireless network in Canada, offering up to 42 Mbps downloading speed. Telus also became the first company to offer the Facebook app on its TV service in 2012. The same year, it launched the 4G LTE wireless network in 14 metropolitan cities in Canada.

Telus Communications Acquisitions

In June 2000, Telus acquired the market-leading bill integration firm CAG-TAMS. It also acquired the shares of GTE in Québec Téléphone (one of the oldest telecom companies in Quebec) in August 2000 and later renamed it to Telus Québec on April 2, 2001. On 25 October 2000, Telus acquired Clearnet to launch a wireless service in Canada. The next year Telus went on to acquire more companies, including Northwest Digital (NWD) Systems Inc., Columbus Group., PSINet’s Canadian operations and facilities, Daedalian Solutions Inc., Arqana Technologies Inc., and QuebecTel.

In the further years, Telus made some other acquisitions, including  ADCOM, Inc. (2004), Assurent Secure Technologies (2006), Emergis (2008), Black’s Photography (2009), Public Mobile (2013), etc.

The CEO: Darren Entwistle

Darren Entwistle is the CEO and the President of Telus Communications. He is a native of Montreal, Quebec, and completed his high school education at a local public school. Darren has a Bachelor’s degree in Economics (Honours) from Concordia University and an MBA (Finance) from the McGill University Desautels Faculty of Management. He also has got a diploma in Network Engineering from the University of Toronto.

Darren joined Telus in 2000, and before that, he had been with companies like George Weston Ltd., the Business Council of Canada, TD Bank Financial Group, McGill University Board of Governors, and Bell Cablemedia Plc. Bell Cablemedia Plc is a UK-based company, where Darren served as an executive. Being with Telus for the past 20 years has made Darren the longest-serving CEO amongst all the telecommunication companies worldwide.

BOE Technology

BOE Technology – The Largest Display Panel Maker in the World.

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BOE Technology Group Co., Ltd., also known as Jingdongfang, is a China-based electronics and semiconductor company with its headquarters located in Beijing, China. Being an electronics company, BOE Technology exactly knows how much effort it takes to stay strong among great competition from its peers. And, it is tougher to be popular and stay relevant, when the big names from foreign countries are your competitors. BOE Technology is one of the biggest examples of how local products can also be the best, and how buying local products can help the country’s economy, too.

About more than twenty years ago, the company was struggling to make its mark in the industry as the competition was tough. But with constant efforts, BOE Technology is now known on the international level, and companies like Apple Inc. are its permanent customers.

About BOE Technology

BOE Technology is among the leading electronics company in China and expertise in electronics health care, the internet of things, and photovoltaics, such that it produces products like interface devices, smart medicine, smart IoT systems as well as engineering integration-related products. BOE Technology is also famous as the largest supplier of LCD, OED, and flexible/foldable displays. The company also manufactures and sells fingerprint sensors, optoelectronic sensors, and solar panels.

BOE Technology
Image Source: upload.wikimedia.org

BOE Technology has expanded overseas to 19 countries and has over 65,000 people working for it. Looking at the 2018 records, the company earned revenues worth US$14.56 billion and values at US$18 billion. SES-imagotag and Varitronix are its major subsidiaries.

The Founding of BOE Technology

Wang Dongsheng, who was an accountant, founded BOE Technology as Beijing Oriental Electronics Group Co., Ltd in April 1993. He opened the company by overtaking an ailing vacuum tube factory and raising money from his subordinates. Though, in the beginning, the founder had to sell mouthwash to generate extra income, the company soon was manufacturing and selling the products it intended to, i.e. TV and monitor displays.

The sudden rise in revenues helped BOE Technology list the B shares on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, in 1997. The company was then renamed BOE Technology Group Co., Ltd. in 2001. It made its first acquisition in the same year, where it bought the LCD and OLED businesses of SK Hynix for US$22.5 million. In the next two years, the company also bought the flat-panel display business of the same company. In 2009, BOE Technology also acquired the Taipei-based Display Research Center and AIO Manufacturing Plant of Suzhou Gaochuang Electronics.

BOE Technology put the foundation of the BOE Energy Technology Co., Ltd and entered the photovoltaic business in 2009. The company expanded overseas when it opened its branch and an R&D center in Tokyo, Japan (2011) and Santa Clara in Silicon Valley, California (2012). In 2015 and 2016, BOE Technology opened offices in Frankfurt Germany, and New Delhi, India, respectively. In the following years, the company expanded to Dubai, Brazil, Indonesia, South Africa, etc.

The company partnered with the Universal Display Corporation for the supplies of phosphorescent OLED materials. It also entered into a joint venture with Kopin Corporation and Olightek to extend its operations in micro-displays manufacturing. The same year, BOE Technology became the world’s largest LCD TV and monitor producer. As of 2019, the company holds second place on shipping the smartphone OLED panel, Huawei and Samsung being few of its customers.

Acquisitions

In the past decade, BOE Technology has made some of the biggest acquisitions, which have contributed to the growth of the company. K-Tronics (2010), OASIS International Hospital (2015), Varitronix (2016),  SES-imagotag (2018) are some of the BOE’s acquired companies.

The Founder: Wang Dongsheng

Wang Dongsheng founded BOE Technology around 26 years ago at the age of 35. He was working as an accountant in a state-owned vacuum-tube factory, which he took over later to found BOE Technology. Before starting the company, he sold mouthwash for extra income and borrowed money from his subordinates from his former company to start the business. Today, after 26 years, after all the efforts of Dongsheng, BOE Technology is not only the largest electronics and semiconductor company in China but is among the largest LCD-LED suppliers in the world.