American Standard Companies

American Standard Companies, Inc. (known as Ideal Standard in Europe) was a global manufacturer of air conditioning systems and services, bath & kitchen products and vehicle control systems. The company divested all but the air conditioning business in 2007, and renamed itself Trane.^[1] A Fortune 500 listed company with 2004 sales exceeding 9.5 billion United States dollars. The Air conditioning systems and services are sold under the Trane and American Standard brands. The previously owned bathroom and kitchen products sold under such brands as American Standard, Ideal Standard and Armitage Shanks. WABCO was the brand name for the electronic braking, stability, suspension and transmission control systems business.

History

American Standard traces its roots back to 1872, when John B. Pierce opened a tinware shop in Ware, Massachusetts, USA. With the business skills he forged in this shop, he would later found the Pierce Steam Heating Company, one of three companies that would merge in 1892 to become the American Radiator Company. In 1929, the American Radiator Company merged with The Standard Sanitary Manufacturing Company (founded 1875). Products from the combined company could be found in about half of the homes in the U.S. and Europe For the next 18 years, the business was known as the American Radiator & Standard Sanitary Corporation. By 1948, people had informally shortened the name of the company to "American-Standard", so the company began to refer to itself by that name. In 1968, WABCO joined the American Standard family of companies. That same year, American Standard dropped the hyphen from its name. Trane joined the American Standard family of companies in 1984. In 1999, American Standard purchased control of the U.K. based Armitage Shanks and Ceramica Dolomite of Italy from Blue Circle Industries for 430 million United States dollars.

Break up of American Standard

On February 1, 2007, American Standard Cos. announced it would break up its three divisions. The plan included the sale of its kitchen and bath division and spin off WABCO, American Standard's vehicle controls division, while retaining The Trane Company..^[1] WABCO began trading as an independent company on August 1, 2007. The new stock symbol is WBC on the New York Stock Exchange.^[2] On October 31, 2007 American Standard Cos. announced it had completed the sale of the kitchen and bath division to Bain Capital Partners, LLC. This announcement includes the sale of the American Standard name to Bain while American Standard retains the rights to use the "American Standard" name for air conditioning products. American Standard changed its name to Trane on November 28, 2007.^[3]

Management

CEO: Frederic M. Poses

External links

• American Standard Companies, Inc. Website

References