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PBT Telecom Group of history
PBT Telecom Group of company history timeline
In 1850 the first submarine telegraph cable was laid across the English Channel.
1880: Telephone Company Ltd. merges with Edison Telephone Company to form United Telephone Company.
The telegraph and telephone were at first exploited by private enterprises, but they were gradually taken over by a U.K. government department, the General Post Office. It was in the United Kingdom, too, that the first international telephone call was made, in 1891, between England and France.
Comporium, known then as the Rock Hill Telephone Company, was founded in 1894 by John Anderson, John Cherry, and Andrew Smith.
In 1896 the Post Office completed its improved telephone network by taking over the trunk lines of National Telephone Company, the largest of its licensees, and started to set up its own local telephone exchanges.
Rock Hill Telephone acquires Fort Mill Telephone Company (established 1897) and its 293 lines.
Rock Hill Telephone acquires its initial interest in Lancaster Telephone Company (established 1898).
A landmark in the prehistory of BT was the Post Office Act of 1969, which changed the status of the Post Office.
According to Petrov, “the development of Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre pivoted on that promise.” Together, they went on to found Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre in 1969 in affiliation with Point Park College, and supported by its innovative young president, Arthur Blum.
Defining Moments of the 70s 1970–71: PBT presents its first subscription season at the Syria Mosque.
In 1971 Loti and Leon Falk purchased PBT’s first studio space on the Boulevard of the Allies.
1977: Nicolas Petrov steps down as artistic director.
When Petrov stepped down to focus on the Point Park program, John Gilpin, of London’s Festival Ballet, briefly led the company until Patrick Franz, a former Paris Opera Ballet dancer, took the helm in 1978.
1978: Patrick Franz is named Artistic Director.
1979: PBT School is established.
First came the passage of the 1981 British Telecommunications Act, which took Post Office Telecommunications out of the Post Office, turning it into an autonomous, though still state-owned, body known as British Telecommunications Corporation or, more familiarly, British Telecom.
In 1982, PBT entered a new era with the appointment of Patricia Wilde as artistic director – a position she would hold for 15 years.
In 1983 the government undertook for seven years not to license any company but BT and Mercury to carry telecommunications services over fixed links.
In 1983, Loti and Leon Falk purchased a warehouse in the Strip District and gifted it to PBT to refurbish into a new, more expansive home for both the Company and School.
In November 1984, 3.01 billion ordinary shares of 25 pence were offered for sale at 130 pence per share, the first figure being the nominal or face value of the share, and the second its sale price, or market value, at the time of sale.
Under the terms of the 1984 act, BT's main activity was to supply telecommunications services in the U.K. market of 55 million people in accordance with a 25-year operating license from the Department of Trade and Industry.
1986: PBT School launches the Schenley Program for high school students.
1987: Loti Falk retires as executive director.
In February 1989 BT bought, for £907 million, a 20 percent interest in McCaw Cellular Communications, Inc., a United States mobile cellular telephone and broadcasting systems provider and operator.
1989: PBT’s first arts education and engagement programs begin.
In response, BT continued the cost-cutting program it began in 1990.
BT was then allowed to proceed with further rebalancing between telephone rentals and call charges and with customized tariffs. It was announced that the sale of a slice of the government's residual share in BT would take place in November 1991.
In the following year, 18,800 jobs were shed and overtime work was cut, while another 10,000 terminations were planned for 1991-92.
While at least 98 percent of its revenues and profits continued to come from its home market, the additional competition allowed under the 1991 review of the duopoly policy combined with continued moves by Oftel to reduce BT's monopoly began to seriously erode BT's position in the U.K. market.
In 1991 the company set up a subsidiary, Syncordia Corp., in Atlanta, Georgia, to start such a network on its own, but had little success attracting either customers or the telecommunications partners it needed around the world to make the venture succeed.
1991: PBT completes $1.5 million stabilization campaign.
Perhaps not coincidentally, these BT-Oftel battles took place after 1993, the year in which the British government sold nearly all of its remaining stake in BT for $7.43 billion.
1993: PBT launches the $18 million Campaign for Permanence to expand endowment and improve facilities.
Later in 1995, the regulator announced that it wanted to reduce BT's return on capital from the 15.6 percent of 1995 to as low as 8 percent.
A foothold in the important German market also was secured in a 1995 alliance with the German conglomerate Viag AG, in which the partners planned to start a joint venture that would offer Concert services.
Taking over as CEO in early 1996, Bonfield had been the chief executive of ICL PLC, a British computer company owned by Fujitsu Ltd.
Perhaps, therefore, needing to move faster than AT&T to secure a global network, it appeared in early 1996 that BT might try effecting a major merger to gain its missing Asian link.
The two corporations entered negotiations in the summer of 1996, and by the following summer were on the verge of inking a $22 billion agreement.
The deal stalled in August 1997, however, with MCI's announcement that it expected to suffer losses of up to $800 million for the previous year.
In 1997, he returned to Pittsburgh as artistic director.
In July 1998 it entered into a promising new partnership with AT&T, wherein the companies merged their international operations into a single entity.
One particularly attractive target was Japan; in March 1999, the companies acquired a combined 30 percent stake in Japan Telecom, the country's fourth largest telephone company.
Encouraged by the initial promise of the joint venture, the companies pooled their global wireless phone operations in September 1999.
BT aimed to have a fully digital network by the year 2000.
Worse, BT's efforts to achieve a wide global reach over a short period ultimately spread its resources far too thin, and by May 2001 the company had accumulated $43 billion in debt and was reporting its first fiscal year loss since becoming privatized.
2004: Endowment tops $4 million.
2006: Harris N. Ferris is named executive director.
2008: PBT presents the North American premiere of Derek Deane’s Alice in Wonderland; company ends second consecutive fiscal year in the black.
2010: PBT School opens first student residency, Byham House, and installs sprung floors in all five studios.
2012: PBT performs in Israel’s 45th-annual Karmiel Dance Festival, the company’s first overseas tour in 20 years.
2013: PBT becomes first professional company in the United States to present a sensory-friendly version of The Nutcracker.
2016: The Byham Center for Dance, with state-of-the art studio and training space, opens on PBT”s campus.
2018: PBT completes a $21 million dollar capital campaign.
2019: PBT launches its 50th anniversary season and celebration.
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