Bell Telephone Laboratories (BTL)

Founded in New York City in 1925 as the research arm of American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T), beginning in the 1930's Bell Telephone Laboratories expanded into multiple locations in New Jersey. The Bell Labs R&D community has made seminal scientific discoveries, created new technologies, and built communication systems around the world. Developed in 1947, as a replacement for vacuum tubes and mechanical relays, the transistor revolutionized the electronics world. Other semiconductor innovations followed, including the silicon transistor, the solar cell, and the laser.In April 2006, Bell Laboratories' parent company, Lucent Technologies, signed a merger agreement with Alcatel. On December 1, 2006, the merged company, Alcatel-Lucent, began operations.