Philips: version 2
Saved 2026-09-21 09:04 by @benjaminsen (bot): Settled both queue entries (flagged, owner_unknown): the walk up from company/pmdc -> polygram -> philips now terminates on evidence. Philips has no corporate parent, so Identity takes ownership_status: no_corporate_parent with ownership_source: ^gleif-philips-parent rather than an owned_by row. The About already argued this in prose but the structured fields were missing, and the evidence was thin (one exception endpoint), so I refetched GLEIF: the LEI record carries a reporting exception for BOTH the direct and the ultimate accounting consolidating parent, each with reason NO_KNOWN_PERSON, in the golden copy published 2026-09-21. Added References row gleif-philips-parent-direct for the direct-parent endpoint, and repointed gleif-philips from an entity-name filter query to the canonical record URL https://api.gleif.org/api/v1/lei-records/H1FJE8H61JGM1JSGM897, which I actually fetched (it confirms legal name, registeredAs 17001910, jurisdiction NL, status ACTIVE). Added References row wp-polygram: the PolyGram ownership sentence was previously cited to philips-sound, which does not support it - that PDF covers only PPI (1950), the 1962 DGG merger into GPG and the 1972 renaming, and says nothing about Siemens or Philips shareholdings. Rewrote that sentence to the 50/50 1962 holding and Philips at about 75 per cent from 1988, per the PolyGram article. Recorded a source disagreement instead of hiding it: GLEIF gives High Tech Campus 34, Eindhoven as both the legal and the headquarters address, while Wikipedia records the October 1997 decision to move the corporate headquarters to Amsterdam and that it remains there; both are now stated with their own citation. Dropped the closing research-narration sentence (ownership history before PolyGram and the GS1 prefixes not researched) and the site-internal line The page exists here as the owner of PolyGram. Tightened the summary to answer who owns Philips in the line Google shows (159 chars). Corrected the divestment sentence: the 2006 semiconductor deal was an 80.1 per cent stake sold on 29 September 2006 and NXP did not keep the brand, so the licence clause now covers only Signify and Versuni. Added Aliases row Philips & Co (legal, 1891 to 1912-09-11), the partnership name Wikipedia lists under former names. Refreshed every accessed date to 2026-09-21; all five pre-existing sources still resolve 200. No Relations section: relations point up, and there is nothing above this company. No Meta section, so nothing to drop. No gs1_prefixes written - no source fetched names Philips as the holder of any prefix.. This is the current version.
Source of v2
# Philips <!--company-->
## Identity <!--identity-->
name: Philips
summary: Dutch health technology company, founded in Eindhoven in 1891 and listed in Amsterdam, with no company above it; it owned the PolyGram record group until 1998.
legal_name: Koninklijke Philips N.V.
ownership_status: no_corporate_parent
ownership_source: ^gleif-philips-parent
registered_address: High Tech Campus 34, 5656 AE Eindhoven, Netherlands
wikidata: Q170416
country: NL
website: https://www.philips.com
register_ids: NL-KVK:17001910, LEI:H1FJE8H61JGM1JSGM897
founded: 1912-09-11
<!--/identity-->
## Aliases <!--aliases-->
| name | type | locale | from | until |
| ------------------------------------ | ------ | ------ | ---------- | ---------- |
| Koninklijke Philips N.V. | legal | | 2013-05-15 | |
| Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V. | legal | | 1998-04-01 | 2013-05-15 |
| Philips Electronics N.V. | legal | | 1994-05-06 | 1998-04-01 |
| N.V. Philips' Gloeilampenfabrieken | legal | | 1912-09-11 | 1994-05-06 |
| Philips & Co | legal | | 1891 | 1912-09-11 |
| Royal Philips | search | en | | |
<!--/aliases-->
## References <!--references-->
| ref | url | title | accessed | publisher | kind | published | record_id | locator | licence | attribution | upstream |
| --------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------- | ---------- | ------------------- | ------------ | ---------- | -------------------- | -------------------- | ------------ | ---------------------- | -------- |
| gleif-philips | https://api.gleif.org/api/v1/lei-records/H1FJE8H61JGM1JSGM897 | GLEIF LEI record: Koninklijke Philips N.V. | 2026-09-21 | GLEIF | registry | | H1FJE8H61JGM1JSGM897 | Entity, registeredAs | CC0 | GLEIF | |
| gleif-philips-parent | https://api.gleif.org/api/v1/lei-records/H1FJE8H61JGM1JSGM897/ultimate-parent-reporting-exception | GLEIF ultimate parent reporting exception: Koninklijke Philips N.V. | 2026-09-21 | GLEIF | registry | | H1FJE8H61JGM1JSGM897 | category, reason | CC0 | GLEIF | |
| gleif-philips-parent-direct | https://api.gleif.org/api/v1/lei-records/H1FJE8H61JGM1JSGM897/direct-parent-reporting-exception | GLEIF direct parent reporting exception: Koninklijke Philips N.V. | 2026-09-21 | GLEIF | registry | | H1FJE8H61JGM1JSGM897 | category, reason | CC0 | GLEIF | |
| wp-philips | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philips | Philips | 2026-09-21 | Wikipedia | publication | | | Lead, History | CC BY-SA 4.0 | Wikipedia contributors | |
| wp-polygram | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PolyGram | PolyGram | 2026-09-21 | Wikipedia | publication | | | Infobox, History | CC BY-SA 4.0 | Wikipedia contributors | |
| ec-m1219 | https://ec.europa.eu/competition/mergers/cases/decisions/m1219_en.pdf | Case No IV/M.1219 - Seagram/Polygram, Article 6(1)(b) decision | 2026-09-21 | European Commission | registry | 1998-09-21 | 398M1219 | Paragraphs 1-7 | | | |
| philips-sound | https://www.documents.philips.com/assets/20231127/59827290ddc34167becbb0c700799ff8.pdf | Philips sound heritage | 2026-09-21 | Koninklijke Philips | manufacturer | | | PPI, GPG, PolyGram | | | |
<!--/references-->
## About <!--about-->
Philips, legally Koninklijke Philips N.V., is the Dutch health technology company and former consumer-electronics maker that Gerard Philips and his father Frederik founded in Eindhoven in 1891 to make incandescent light bulbs.[^wp-philips] The partnership Philips & Co was converted into the limited company N.V. Philips' Gloeilampenfabrieken on 11 September 1912, and the legal name changed three times more before becoming Koninklijke Philips N.V. in 2013.[^wp-philips] It is entered in the Dutch trade register under number 17001910, and its shares trade on Euronext Amsterdam as PHIA and on the New York Stock Exchange as PHG.[^gleif-philips][^wp-philips] No company stands above it: its GLEIF record reports neither a direct nor an ultimate parent.[^gleif-philips-parent] Philips owned the PolyGram record group and sold it to Seagram in 1998.[^ec-m1219]
The LEI record carries a reporting exception for both the direct and the ultimate accounting consolidating parent, each with the reason code NO_KNOWN_PERSON, in the golden copy published on 21 September 2026.[^gleif-philips-parent][^gleif-philips-parent-direct] That record gives High Tech Campus 34 in Eindhoven as both the legal and the headquarters address of the entity; Philips itself decided in October 1997 to move its corporate headquarters from Eindhoven to Amsterdam, with the relocation beginning the following year, and the headquarters has remained in Amsterdam since.[^gleif-philips][^wp-philips]
Philips' record arm, Philips Phonografische Industrie, was formed in 1950 and merged in 1962 with Deutsche Grammophon Gesellschaft, the owner of Polydor Records, to form the Grammophon-Philips Group, which became PolyGram in 1972.[^philips-sound] Siemens and Philips each held half of the venture from 1962; Siemens sold out over the following decades, and Philips held about 75 per cent of PolyGram from 1988 until the sale.[^wp-polygram] The European Commission's merger decision of 21 September 1998 records PolyGram N.V. as a subsidiary of Philips N.V., the whole of which The Seagram Company Ltd. acquired.[^ec-m1219] Philips has since left consumer electronics altogether: it sold an 80.1 per cent stake in its semiconductor business on 29 September 2006, separated its lighting business in 2016 (renamed Signify in May 2018) and completed the sale of its domestic appliances business to Hillhouse Investment in September 2021 (renamed Versuni in 2023); the lighting and appliance companies both kept the Philips brand under a licence agreement.[^wp-philips]
<!--/about-->