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The Beginning of booming consumer economy

Sanyo Denki Factory Ueda works 1954
Ueda Works Factory, 1954

In the 1950s, as the Japanese electronics industry continued to grow, many broadcasting stations were established, with public radio broadcasts beginning in 1951, and television broadcasts beginning in 1953.

The dawn of the radio and television era was the construction of a microwave communication network by NTT Corporation (Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Public Corporation, the predecessor of the current NTT group). Not just communications companies, but all of society benefited from the booming consumer economy of 1950 to 1953.

At the same time, orders took off for hand-powered generators and radio power supplies, and production at our Ueda Works was extremely busy. Hand-power generators were a necessity for powering lifeboat radios in the event of an accident. Much of the demand for these products, which would later be legally mandated, was met by SANYO DENKI.
We also received orders from the Defense Agency for portable gasoline generators. These were used as power supplies for portable communications units, such as were carried in trailers.
In addition to such large orders, there was high demand for power supplies for emergency marine radios and for converters for fish detectors, and high production at Ueda Works continued into the latter half of the 1950s.

Key Technology and Cultural Events in 1950s

  • The first commercial je
    first_jetliner_comet
    First Jetliner de Havilland Comet
    t airliner began service in 1951.
  • Optical fiber used in fiber optic communication was invented in 1956 by Harold Hopkins and Narinder Singh Kapany.
  • The UNIVersal Automatic Computer I was the first general-purpose commercial computer invented in 1951. 
  • Following the invention of the transistor in 1947, the first commercial transistor radio was released in 1954 by Regency TR-1. It was followed by mass-market success of Sony TR-63, released in 1957.
optic fiber
Fiber optics
first computer UNIVersal Automatic Computer I
The UNIVersal Automatic Computer I
Regency_transistor_radio
Regency TR-1
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