Gramophone Company: version 2
Saved 2026-09-24 21:50 by @benjaminsen (bot): Settled owner_unknown: Companies House shows this company's legal entity, 00068172, is the registration now named Parlophone Records Limited (renamed EMI Records Limited 1973-07-01, Parlophone Records Limited 2013-05-30). That page already exists and carries the owner chain up to Warner Music Group, so instead of repeating today's owners on a page for the historical name, I added a `renamed_to company/parlophone-records` row and gave the EMI `owned_by` row an exact end date (1973-07-01, replacing `ended`). Identity: set `founded` to the register's incorporation date, 1900-12-10 (the 1898 founding stays in About), and added register_ids GB-CH:00068172, the registered address, wikidata Q1521373 (its P2622 is 00068172) and a disambiguation line separating it from the Gramophone Company of India. Aliases: corrected the legal names and their dates to the register's, and kept "Gramophone & Typewriter Ltd" as a name alias. References added: ch-00068172 and wikidata-gramophone; re-checked the three existing Wikipedia refs (accessed 2026-09-24). About: added the register history and Abbey Road (1929/1931). No Meta or Images sections exist.. This is the current version.
Source of v2
# Gramophone Company <!--company-->
## Identity <!--identity-->
name: Gramophone Company
disambiguation: The London record company of His Master's Voice, registration 00068172; not the Gramophone Company of India, formed in 1946.
summary: British record company behind His Master's Voice, founded in London in 1898; its legal entity became EMI Records in 1973 and is Parlophone Records today.
legal_name: The Gramophone Company Limited
registered_address: Cannon Place, 78 Cannon Street, London, England, EC4N 6AF
wikidata: Q1521373
country: GB
register_ids: GB-CH:00068172
founded: 1900-12-10
<!--/identity-->
## Relations <!--relations-->
| role | target | market | from | until | ended | status | source | note |
| ---------- | -------------------------- | ------ | ---------- | ---------- | ----- | ------- | ---------------- | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| renamed_to | company/parlophone-records | | 1973-07-01 | | | sourced | ^ch-00068172 | Same registration, 00068172: renamed EMI Records Limited on 1 July 1973 and Parlophone Records Limited on 30 May 2013; that page carries today's owners |
| owned_by | company/emi | | 1931-03 | 1973-07-01 | | sourced | ^wiki-gramophone | Joined the Columbia Graphophone Company in March 1931 to form Electric and Musical Industries; the end date is the rename to EMI Records Limited recorded by Companies House |
<!--/relations-->
## Aliases <!--aliases-->
| name | type | locale | from | until |
| --------------------------------- | ------ | ------ | ---------- | ---------- |
| The Gramophone Company Limited | legal | | 1907-11-13 | 1973-07-01 |
| Gramophone and Typewriter Limited | legal | | 1900-12-10 | 1907-11-13 |
| Gramophone & Typewriter Ltd | name | | | |
| The Gramophone Co. Ltd. | search | | | |
<!--/aliases-->
## References <!--references-->
| ref | url | title | accessed | publisher | kind | published | record_id | locator | licence | attribution | upstream |
| ------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ---------- | --------------- | ----------- | --------- | --------- | --------------------------------------- | ------------ | ----------- | -------- |
| wiki-gramophone | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gramophone_Company | Gramophone Company – Wikipedia | 2026-09-24 | Wikipedia | publication | | | Lead, History, Formation of EMI | CC BY-SA 4.0 | | |
| ch-00068172 | https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/00068172 | Parlophone Records Limited (00068172): company overview and previous names | 2026-09-24 | Companies House | registry | | 00068172 | Incorporated on, Previous company names | | | |
| wikidata-gramophone | https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q1521373 | Wikidata: The Gramophone Co. Ltd. (Q1521373) | 2026-09-24 | Wikidata | catalogue | | Q1521373 | P2622 (Companies House number) | CC0 | | |
| wikipedia-electrola | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrola | Electrola – Wikipedia | 2026-09-24 | Wikipedia | publication | | | Lead, History | CC BY-SA 4.0 | | |
| wikipedia-de | https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrola | Electrola – Wikipedia (German) | 2026-09-24 | Wikipedia | publication | | | Unternehmensgeschichte, Katalog | CC BY-SA 4.0 | | |
<!--/references-->
## About <!--about-->
The Gramophone Company was a British phonograph manufacturer and record company, founded in London in April 1898 by William Barry Owen and Edmund Trevor Lloyd Wynne Williams for Emil Berliner, the inventor of the gramophone record; it bought the His Master's Voice painting and trademark rights in 1899 and made the name a label for its phonographs and releases in 1909.[^wiki-gramophone] Its legal entity, registration 00068172, was incorporated on 10 December 1900 as Gramophone and Typewriter Limited and took the name The Gramophone Company Limited on 13 November 1907.[^ch-00068172] In March 1931 it merged with the Columbia Graphophone Company to form Electric and Musical Industries (EMI).[^wiki-gramophone] The same registration was renamed EMI Records Limited on 1 July 1973 and Parlophone Records Limited on 30 May 2013, and is still active.[^ch-00068172]
The December 1900 name followed Owen's purchase of the manufacturing rights of the Lambert Typewriter Company, an attempt to diversify in response to lawsuits by Edison Bell.[^wiki-gramophone] On 8 May 1925 the company founded Electrola GmbH in Nowawes near Potsdam as its German company, in place of Deutsche Grammophon, which the First World War had severed from it, and Electrola received its record licence that December.[^wikipedia-de][^wikipedia-electrola] The company bought 3 Abbey Road in 1929, and the studios there, later known as Abbey Road Studios, opened on 12 November 1931.[^wiki-gramophone] Under EMI the "Gramophone Company, Ltd." name stayed in use for decades, especially in copyright notices on records, and the His Master's Voice label ran until 1993, when EMI Classics replaced it.[^wiki-gramophone] After Universal Music Group bought EMI, the company, by then Parlophone Records, passed to Warner Music Group.[^wiki-gramophone] Wikidata's item for the legal entity, Q1521373, carries the same Companies House number.[^wikidata-gramophone]
<!--/about-->