Lucent and Quality Business
The history of Lucent starts with AT&G, which is one of the oldest telecom companies in the world. In 1996, the company became its own entity – similar to how General Motors spun off Delphi in the automotive business back around the same time.
Originally, like most businesses with roots in the past century, AT&T was once a conglomerate that fulfilled many business functions and eventually became Lucent and a networking system. The telecom equipment business was once dominated by the likes of Western Electric, which had a plant in Cicero, Illinois. (Interestingly enough, Western Electric held a retreat for their massive employee base, which included a ship sailing on Lake Michigan, which overturned in-harbor in Chicago, and became known as the Eastland Disaster.) When the money was in manufacturing telephones and their accessories, these companies were very profitable by making phones, wires, and everything else that came along with the territory – but eventually this was not to be the case.
Entering the 21st century, most companies in the U.S. that are profitable, are out of the direct business of manufacturing their goods. This included AT&T – the company wanted to retain their business of phone technology, but not of the manufacturing portion. To this end, they spun off the business to become its own business, which manufactures phones and their components. It is not an unusual one, but clearly, the web that businesses weave in the 21st century are interesting and complex. This business is one of many companies that are out there with one foot in the analog and one foot in the digital world and will probably remain as such for many years to come.