''. The company
Laing, Wharton and Down was formed in 1886 to sell products from the
Thomson-Houston Electric Company. Laing, Wharton and Down soon won a contract for electrical lighting for the east end of London. In 1894 Laing, Wharton and Down purchased patents and exclusive production rights from the American company, now known as
General Electric after Thomson-Houston merged with
Edison General Electric Company in 1892. At this stage Laing, Wharton and Down was renamed as
British Thomson-Houston and General Electric became the majority owner of the company. Once BTH had the production licences for Thomson-Houston's products it started setting up factories in the
English Midlands, with
Rugby, Warwickshire chosen as the main location due to its good accessibility by rail and a local coal supply. In 1900 BTH bought Glebe Farm on the west side of Mill Road north of the railway in Rugby for £10,000, from Thos. Hunter & Co., to build their factory on it. The Mill Road factory opened in 1902 and made
electric motors and
generators. In the same year BTH obtained a licence to produce the
Curtis steam turbine, which became one of the company's major products. In 1905 BTH made its first
turbo-alternator and in 1911 got licences for all of General Electric's drawn-wire
light bulbs, which it produced under the
Mazda trademark. In 1907 BTH started a joint venture with
Wolseley Motors to make
petrol-electric buses and in 1909 the company supplied major coal-fired steam generators to London to power an electric
trolley system that was being set up. Rivalry with Metrovick intensified, particularly after BTH won the contract to build the new
Buenos Aires Central Costanera S.A. power station, valued at £35 million, in 1957. Lyttelton continued to try to reduce this friction, leading to several unsuccessful reorganisations and slipping profits. Quartzelec and
Converteam worked on electrical engineering projects in some of the early BTH buildings, notably buildings 4, 193 and 140. A public road was built through the site between its former east and west gates. In 2012 Converteam was bought out by
General Electric, therefore coming full circle back to when they were partnered in AEI. Converteam (now GE) produced rotating machines and used former-BTH equipment (machines) for running tests. ==Research==