Megger
Megger Instruments Limited was based at AVO’s Dover site, in Archcliffe Road, Dover, CT17 9EN, Kent, England, which is also the present location of the UK branch of the company.
In 1991, due to the popularity of the AVO products the company changed the name to AVO Megger Instruments Limited. In 2000 the company became known as AVO International Holdings Limited and in 2002 as AVO International Limited.
Finally the whole Megger group changed its name to Megger Group Limited in 2002, as it is known today.
The Dover site employs around 230 people. [28] In total (including the sales channels) Megger Group Limited employs around 1500 people worldwide.
In recognition of the ground breaking inventions, which made it possible to build the Megger group, the main meeting rooms at the Dover site are named after Evershed and Macadie.
Biddle
For many years, the James G. Biddle Company in Pennsylvania, was the United States importer of Megger products, as well as a manufacturer of equipment under their own name. In 1989, using concepts introduced by Commonwealth Edison Company of Chicago, Biddle started development of a range of equipment to test the integrity of large batterysystems, which led to the BITE (Battery Impedance Test Equipment) line of products.
In 1991 Biddle, Megger and MultiAmp joined together to form AVO International. The use of the Biddle trademark was retained for many of products still available today. Biddle was one of the first companies to provide commercial cable fault locators. [29]
States
Megger Group Ltd. owns the US site in Dallas, Texas. They manufacture terminal blocks and test switches under the trademark States (existing since the 1940s). [30
PowerDB was acquired in autumn 2005. They provide "acceptance and maintenance test data management software" which is compatible with many Megger products. [31]
Programma
Programma Electric AB was a Swedish electrical test and measurement equipment manufacturer founded in 1976. [32] It provided products including: circuit breaker analysers, battery load testers, primary injection testers, vacuum interrupter testers, microhmmeters and protective relay test instruments. The production plant facility was located in Täby, Sweden.
In March 2001 Programma was sold to GE Energy and joined Megger Group Ltd. in June 2007 [33] [34] as Megger Sweden AB. The company was relocated in April 2013 from Täby to Danderyd.[35]
Pax Diagnostics
In October 2008 Megger Group Ltd. acquired Pax Diagnostics in Sweden. Pax manufactures transformer testing and insulation diagnostics equipment. Pax Diagnostics was founded in 2004 by former employees of Programma Electric, and it is also based in Täby. [36]
SebaKMT has main development and manufacturing sites in Germany and the USA. This acquisition meant substantial increase of Megger's turnover. As a result the Group's position on the market of test equipment for the electrical power sector increased significantly.[38]In July 2012 Megger acquired SebaKMT specialising in power cable fault location and testing, and pipe leakage detection.[37]
SebaKMT developed and introduced the arc-reflection method for testing electrical faults in cables.
Intellectual property
Trademarks[
The first trademark of the company, the name Megger was registered in 1903 and it remains the intellectual property of the Megger Ltd.
Most of the names and trademarks of the acquired companies are now owned by Megger Group Ltd. Apart from "Megger" itself, the best known ones are: AVO, Biddle, Biddle AVO, Biddle Megger, States, PowerDB, and recently Programma and Pax Diagnostics.
However, some of the names of the products are also protected: Megger, AVO, DLRO, MFT, MIT, MPRT, etc.
The Group publishes a copyrighted but distributed for free quarterly magazine titled "Electrical tester" aimed at electrical engineers who might use products from the Megger range.[39]
Patents
It is difficult to assess the actual number of patents, because some of them were obtained before acquired companies joined Megger Group. The original Megger insulation tester patent is over 100 years old.
On 25 May 2003 Megger Group celebrated a century of innovation. [40]
The table shows a timeline of some typical devices introduced by Megger Group companies (not necessarily covered with patents). In recent years the company has also paid more attention to the ergonomics and design of their products. [41]
| Year | Device |
|---|---|
| 1889 | Portable insulation tester (Megger) |
| 1908 | Low resistance Ohmmeter (LRO) |
| 1923 | Multimeter with Amps, Volts and Ohms (AVO) |
| 1928 | Multistation watt-hour meter test board |
| 1942 | Resistive load box |
| 1950 | Cable fault locator |
| 1951 | Protective relay test set |
| 1953 | Partial discharge (Corona) detection system |
| 1968 | Portable digital multimeter |
| 1979 | Digital line earth loop impedance tester |
| 1985 | Microprocessor-based high current test set |
| 1989 | Battery impedance test equipment (BITE) |
| 1990 | Automatic 10kV insulation power factor test set |
| 1990 | Microprocessor-based protective relay test set |
| 1994 | DSP-driven watthour meter test set |
| 1996 | Windows-based Testing Software Program |
| 1999 | Time-domain reflectometer with TX Null technology (TDR) |
| 2000 | Micro-weight Low Resistance Ohmmeter (DLRO) |
| 2003 | High power Relay test set with user features |
| 2003 | Multi-function tester with ergonomic design |
| 2005 | Noise immune 10kV insulation tester |
| 2007 | Loop impedance in an RCCB electrical test circuit tester [42] |
| 2009 | Three-phase transformer turns ratio test sets (TTR) |
| 2010 | Transformer ohmmeter (MTO) |
| 2010 | Cable fault location system (PFL) |
| 2011 | Automatic 12kV insulation power/dissipation factor test set (DELTA) |
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