Raytheon Anschütz

The SG Radar
An Early Raytheon System

            What we know today as the Raytheon Company, based in Waltham, MA, started its corporate life in 1925 as the American Appliance Company, a new-start business that placed great hopes on a new technology for domestic refrigeration. This technology failed, and the company turned to an entirely different venture: a gaseous tube that would allow radios to operate from domestic power rather than the very expensive batteries in use at the time. Viewed from afar, this may seem a trivial invention; through the lens of history, though, it transformed the entertainment industry, bringing radio broadcasts within the reach of every household. The tube was named for 'a beam of light' 'from the gods', or 'ray'-'theon', presumably alluding to the source of inspiration for the inventor. Not long after, the American Appliance Company was compelled to change its name, and adopted the name of that tube as its new corporate identity.  The Raytheon Company has continued as an independent venture ever since.

            The transition from power-conversion tubes to magnetron tubes was no great stride: Raytheon was among the front-runners in the development of the earliest operational radar systems for the military, including its SG radar that eventually deployed on nearly 1000 US Navy vessels. When peace broke out, the world at large may have been slow to take up radar usage in its merchant fleets, but not so the USA: Raytheon installed the first of its civil Mariners' Pathfinder radars on the newly-built ocean liner SS America and her sister ships as early as 1946.

            As with all larger companies, Raytheon has undergone numerous transformations and acquired many interests over the years. Having dabbled with recreational marine electronics for several years, in 1998 it purchased the marine electronics interests of the German firearms manufacturer Anschuetz, and created a new subsidiary, Raytheon GmbH, to lead all of the company's MNR manufacturing activities. This subsidiary was split in 2001, by a management buy-out of the recreational electronics interests that formed Raymarine, and what remained became the company's high-seas component, Raytheon Anschütz. 

            Because of the manner in which the Raytheon Marine division was split, many so-called 'Raytheon' systems are, in fact, now considered to be Raymarine products, regardless of any labeling or documentation. Only the 'high seas' systems remain in the Raytheon Anschütz inventory and these are described in Appendix 1. Appendix 2 awaits an opportunity for describing measurement and observation, when this is undertaken. Finally, it is worth noting that evidence of the long-standing relationship between Raytheon and JRC still abounds, with many instances of JRC-designed and manufactured radars bearing the Raytheon logo.