Svetlana Factory

Categories / Economy/Industry
SVETLANA FACTORY (27 Engelsa Avenue) is an open joint-stock company (from 1993), the largest factory in design and manufacturing of powerful electric vacuum tubes and microelectronics. The factory started as a handicraft workshop for making cigarette paper cases, founded in 1889 by Y. M. Ayvaz. The workshop was reorganised as the machine building joint-stock company of Y. M. Ayvaz in 1911. The electric light bulbs department under the name of Svetlana was set up in 1913. The company was nationalised in 1919 and Svetlana factory for production of electric incandescent lamps was incorporated in 1920. In 1928 Svetlana merged with the Leningrad Plant Of Vacuum Tubes and became the largest factory in the country producing receivers, amplifiers, generating and grid lamps of small power, mercurial retorts, gas tubes, thyratrons, ignitrons, x-ray tubes, television tubes and iconoscopes. In 1933, the Branch Vacuum Laboratory was organised at the factory under the supervision of Academician S. A. Vekshinsky, which fact encouraged the development of national electronics. In 1929-41, some 390 types of new devices were produced at the factory. Oscillator tubes under the brand name of Svetlana were awarded the Grand Prix at the World Fair in Paris in 1937. In 1941-45, the factory produced ammunition, electric devices and lighting bulbs. In 1949, the Plant Of X-Ray Devices was incorporated into the structure of Svetlana. In 1952, the first bifocal medical x-ray tube was invented. Manufacturing of transistors started in 1955. Svetlana Leningrad Electric Device Corporation (SLEDC) was established in 1962. A computing centre was created in 1967. The first Automated Production Line was developed at Svetlana as well. The Research and Development Centre was set up in 1971. In 1972, the first Russian-made calculators Electronica 24-71 were manufactured here; the first single board micro Electric Calculating Machine Electronics С5-11 was designed in 1976, and the single-chip 16-discharge micro electric calculating machine was made in 1979. In the 1980s, Svetlana Factory produced oscillator tubes and modulator tubes, x-ray tubes for medical, industrial and scientific purposes, microelectronic devices for computer equipment, and semi-conductor devices. In the 1990s the Factory took a leading position in the sphere of designing and making vacuum tubes, klystrons, x-ray tubes, high-frequency transistors, single-chip microprocessor systems and microcontrollers. The devices and equipment produced at Svetlana Factory are used in radar plants, С-300, Buk, TOR, Tunguska Complexes, MiG airplanes, satellite communications systems and reconnaissance equipment. In the 1990s Svetlana Corporation organised several affiliated companies, including Svetlana- Roentgen Closed-Type Association (1993), Svetlana-Electron Device Closed-Type Association (1994) and others, all in all 9 companies specialising in manufacturing specific types of products. The name of Svetlanovsky Avenue originates from the name of Svetlana Factory.

References: "Светлана": История Ленингр. об-ния электрон. приборостроения "Светлана". Л., 1986; Щукин Г. А. Акционерное общество "Светлана" // Петерб. журн. электроники. 1993. № 1. С. 15-20; Золотая книга Санкт-Петербурга. СПб., 2000. [Т. 1]. С. 194-195.

T. V. Kovaleva. Ayvaz Yakov Moiseevich
Vekhshinsky Sergey Arkadievich
Engelsa Ave/Saint Petersburg, city, house 27
Svetlanovsky Ave/Saint Petersburg, city
"Светлана". История Ленингр. об-ния электрон. приборостроения "Светлана". Л., 1986
Золотая книга Санкт-Петербурга. СПб., 2000
Щукин Г.А. Акционерное общество "Светлана" // Петерб. журн. электроники, 1993