Standard Elektrik Lorenz See --> C. Lorenz

Starr Piano Co.
Originally founded in 1872 in Richmond, Indiana, USA by German immigrant George Trayser and associates as a manufacturer of pianos, but note that it has not been possible to establish exactly under what name since the company frequently changed names during its formative years, it was incorporated in 1878 as the Starr Piano Company and named after the Starr family which was the company's main financial backer at the time.

During the 1880's the company transformed from a generic manufacturer of handmade pianos to a mass manufacturer of upright pianos although they did continue to make some grands and player pianos. In 1893 the Starr Piano Co. was re-incorporated under the same name but then with a shared ownership between Starr family on one hand and John Lumsden and Henry Gennett (1852 to 1922) on the other, and in 1898 Henry Gennett took over the presidency of the company.

Following the death of John Starr in 1903 the company was taken over by the Gennett family, and the company expanded into the manufacture of player pianos at around the same time. When the increasing popularity of phonographic equipment as a source of home entertainment started to eat into sales of upright pianos Starr responded by starting the manufacture of phonographs on a small scale in the early 1910's, while initially a very small part of the operation it was so successful that the company opened a new division and factory in 1916 that not only manufactured phonographs and later radio receivers under the Starr name, but also pressed records both for their own Gennett Records imprint and for other independent labels, the companies venture into pressing actually became the subject of a patent battle between Starr on one hand and Victor and the Gramophone Co. on the other which ended in the courts invalidating the patents of the latter 2 companies in 1922 thereby paving the way for any USA company that wanted to press records to do so without having to ask for permission or pay license fees.

What is less well known is that the company supplied professional audio products under the Gennett name during the 20's and early 30's, this included turntables in addition to cutting and pressing equipment, in fact the transcription turntable pictured in the header of the Turntables is actually a Gennett table from the late 20's. The "consumer goods division" of the company expanded their operation during the 1920's by going into the manufacture of white goods, the company was hit hard by the great depression with the company being forced to close down it's record label (not the pressing plant however), however the white goods manufacture ended up being the Starr's saviour, they opened up a number of warehouses in the southern USA during the depression just to distribute and support their refrigeration products.

The piano and phonographic divisions of the company however never recovered from the effects of the depressions and even the economic boom that happened after the second world war did not manage to boost the fortunes of the company, the slowdown in the sales of pianos did not help and the company made its last piano in the early 1950's and closed its factory soon thereafter. You can visit the homepage of the Starr-Gennett Foundation but they are amongst other things trying to raise funds to preserve what remains of the old factory buildings. The company still exists in the form of the old refrigeration distribution division formally known as the "Starr Piano co., Pacific Division" but changed its name in 1978 to Refrigeration Supplies Distributor and is now a distributor of refrigeration parts and a manufacturer control systems known as RSD/Total Control.

Resources : For an example of a phonograph made by the Starr company take a look at this page
RSD/Total Control homepage - What remains of the Starr Piano Co./Gennett comany
http://www.starrgennett.org - The Starr-Gennett Foundation
Gennett Mansion - Henry Gennett's "Colonial Revival" style mansion is rented out for events and dinner parties etc.

Stephens Electronics
A long running USA based manufacturer of tape recorders and related paraphernalia, note that the company offered modifications and updates for all of their older recorders up until the death of John Stephens in 2007.

Stereo Component Systems
Based in Randolph, Massatuchets, USA distributed Cambrigde Audio products in the USA in the early to mid 70's in addition to selling rebranded products under sundry brandnames, changed their name to Tech HiFi Inc. in 1981 and went bankrupt in 1987.

Stereovox See --> The Signals Collection (Cables 2008 to 2010)

Stewart-Warner Speedometer Corporation
Company based in Bellville, Ontario, Canada that was founded in 1923 to manufacture radios for consumer, commercial and military usage intended for the local market and to distribute car accessories and other products made by its mother company in the USA: Stewart-Warner. Was for a time one of the best know local manufacturer of such, changed its name to Stewart-Warner Alemite Corp. Ltd. in 1931 and after that usually is marked "Stewart Warner Alemite Corporation of Canada" in radio identification plates.

In 1934 a new sub-division was formed that developed car radios and supplied them to the Canadian divisions of Ford Motor Company and Chrysler Corporation. The company appears to have left the radio business in the late 1950's or thereabouts but for the last few years the company appears to be selling mostly USA made radios rather than building them in Canada. Note that S-WA Can. was also active as an OEM and in that capacity supplied products to a number of manufacturers including Sonora Corporation of Canada Ltd.

The company is still around though and these days calls itself Stewart Warner Alemite Corporation of Canada to differentiate itself from its the USA based sister companies, apart from distributing products from the USA it is currently mostly occupied with manufacturing electronic instrumentation products.

Stinger See --> AAMP of Florida (Pre 1997) or Recoton (1998 - 2003)

Stonemarketing
Marketing company based in Cambridge, Massachusets, USA that sold primarily Asian sourced low budget audio products such as portable radios and tape recorders under the Overture brand and to a lesser extent under the Sharpe brand. Company founded in 1973 and disappears around 1981.

Storex (Accessories) See --> Path Ltd. (ca. 1995 to 2003)

Sumo Electric Co. Ltd
USA based manufacturer of mid/high end audio electronics founded by James Bongiorno formerly of GAS around 1980 but sold the company in 1985, originally the company concentrated on pickups and amplifiers but later made more or less a full range of products, disappeared in the latter half of the 90's.

Sunrise House Ltd.
Japanese company based in the Shibuyaku district in Tokyo, was the original trademark owner of the Roadstar brand but it has not been possible to establish if the company was the original manufacturer or just a trading company. Brand later went to Fuji Electronics.

Super E-Caps (Non-polarised capacitors) See --> Jelmax

Svenska Elektronik-Apparater AB (SELA)
Swedish microphone manufacturer based in Stockholm, founded in 1948 by Sixten Lingheim, Lennart Ljungberg, Rudolf Martinson, Tore Ljungberg and Sven Josefsson. Started to supply the then burgeoning Swedish film industry with recording microphones, but the broadcast oriented Neumann was too heavy for boom operators so SELA designed a new microphone around a Neumann capsule that was smaller, much lighter and reportedly better sounding due to driving the transducer differently than the original. The company stopped production in 1972 for reasons not entirely clear to the author but you can get more information on the company and its products from the homepage of Föreningen Svenskt Filmljud (in Swedish).

Swan Speaker Systems
Formed in 1994 by Frank Hale and sold to Acoustic Technology International in 1997.

SWTP/SWTPC See --> SWTP

Symfonia See --> Berkley Testa Electronics

Symphonic Radio and Electronic Corporation.
Originally founded in 1936 but where and under what name is actually unknown, but started selling radio receivers under the Symphonic brand that same year, by 1947 the company was known by it's above name and based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA, and was by then a manufacturer of radios, phonographs and record cutters for personal use. Company had moved to New Brunswick, New Jersey by 1960 and in 1964 it moved to New York and changed its name to Symphonic Electronic Corporation, it was by then selling televisions and tape recorders in addition to its traditional radio and phonographic products but some of them appear to have been sourced from OEM's rather than being made by the company itself. The company appears to have been taken over by Funai Electric Co. in 1986 and that company does indeed still sell some of its product lines under the Symphonic brandname in the USA.

Symphonix Ltd.
A loudspeaker manufacturer based in Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire, England that was founded in 2000, but at the time NXT was trying to sell off its remaining loudspeaker manufacturing capabilities and transform itself into an IP company. The management team of that division decided to buy the factory themselves and formed a new company called Symphonix that took over the manufacturing assets of NXT and licensed the Mission brand-name from them as well. Seemed to be going well for a few years but apparently underfunded and hit some serious financial trouble in 2004 which resulted in the company being taken over by venture capitalists Fundamental-e Investments plc. (FEI) in June that same year. While FEI did reorganise the business to some degree no new cash was injected into the company and Symphonix went into voluntary administration in May 2005 and their assets were sold to International Audio Group in June of that same year.

Syn Factory
Italian manufacturer of lifestyle loudspeakers sold under the U-Vola brand. http://www.synfactory.com

Syntronic Instruments
US based defence subcontractor that specialised in the manufacture of magnetic coils etc.., proposed a range of metal cone speakers in the early 90's that would have some interesting characteristics, these were supposed to be hi-fi speakers primarily but for some reason when they were finally introduced to the market a couple of years later they turned out to be intended for car audio usage only. The core business of the company was sold in 2003 but the loudspeaker division lives on as Alumapro.
Homepage: http://www.syntronicinst.com.

Szabo Audio Systems Limited
Loudspeaker manufacturer run by designer John Szabo and based in Cambridge, Canada.

Next Page : Defunct Audio Companies - Ta to Tg -- Previous Page : Defunct Audio Companies - Sp to Ss