- Otis Elevator Company
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Otis Elevator Company 
Type Subsidiary of UTC Industry Vertical Transport Systems Founded 1853 (acquired in 1976) Headquarters Farmington, Connecticut Products Elevators and Escalators Employees Approximately 63,000 Website otis.com The Otis Elevator Company is the world's largest manufacturer of vertical transportation systems today, principally focusing on elevators and escalators.[citation needed] Founded in Yonkers, New York, USA in 1853 by Elisha Otis, the company pioneered the development of the safety elevator, invented by Otis in 1852, which used a special mechanism to lock the elevator car in place should the hoisting ropes fail.
Otis has installed elevators in some of the world's most famous structures, including the Eiffel Tower, Empire State Building, World Trade Center, The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror, Petronas Twin Towers, Burj Khalifa, CN Tower, the Hotel del Coronado, and the Skylon Tower.
Statistically, Otis is the world's most popular transportation company.[1] It is estimated that the equivalent of the world's population travel in Otis elevators, escalators and moving walkways every three days. According to United Technologies, Otis elevators carry the equivalent of the world's population every nine days.[2]
Otis was acquired by United Technologies in 1976 and is a wholly owned subsidiary. The company has over 60,000 employees, with 2007 revenue of US$11.885 billion. The company headquarters are located in Farmington, Connecticut.
Otis has also dabbled in horizontal automated people-mover "shuttle" systems, such as the Otis Hovair. In 1996, Otis formed a joint venture called Poma-Otis Transportation Systems with the French company Pomagalski to promote these products.
Otis Elevator Company purchased Evans Lifts in the UK. Evans Lifts Ltd. was the oldest and largest manufacturer of lift equipment in the UK and was based in Leicester, England. Otis' Customer Care Centre is still based in the old Evans Lifts building in Leicester. The building has since been extended by Otis.
There are still some installations of Evans Lifts being used today. Notably, an original Evans Lift is still in the Silver Arcade in Leicester. It formerly transported people to the upper floors, but the upper floors are no longer occupied so the lift is no longer used.
Contents
Gen2 Elevator
Otis entered the machine-room-less market with the introduction of the Gen2 elevator system. Otis designed a technology system that employs flat polyurethane-coated steel belts that replace the heavy, woven steel cables which have remained the industry standard since the late 19th century. The belts are approximately 3 mm (0.1 inch) thick and allow for a smaller sheave than conventional elevators. Together with a redesigned machine, this allows the machine to be mounted within the hoistway itself.
The Gen2 Elevator is Otis' machine-room-less competitor to the Mitsubishi Elenessa, Kone EcoDisc, Schindler 400A, 500A And 3300, ThyssenKrupp Synergy, and Fujitec Talon.
President and chairman
- Elisha Graves Otis and Susan A. Houghton circa 1853
- William Delavan Baldwin circa 1926[3][4]
- Percy L. Douglas ? to 1964[5]
- Fayette S. Dunn 1964 to ?[6]
- Didier Michaud-Daniel 2008 to Present
Accidents
- On December 14, 2010, an Otis escalator installed in the International Trade station of Shenzhen Metro Line 1 retrograded without notice, causing 25 passenger injures.[7]
- At 9:36 on July 5, 2011, an Otis 513MPE escalator installed at port A of Beijing Subway Line 4 Zoo Station escalator changed direction without notice, causing 30 people to fall. One boy was killed and 27 people injured, prompting China to halt the use of the escalator model. A Beijing official called the 513MPE escalator “defects in design, manufacturing and maintenance,” and Otis had “unavoidable responsibility for the accident.”[8] Shenzhen Metro authorities confirmed that the cause of the accident was also similar to the Shenzhen accident on December 14. [9]
Factory locations
The floor indicator in an Otis elevator at Port Charlotte High School
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This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it.
- Argenteuil, France
- Bangalore, India
- Berlin, Germany
- Bilbao, Spain
- Bloomfield, U.S.A.
- Břeclav, Czech Republic
- Caponago, Italy
- Cassina, Italy
- Changwon, South Korea
- Gien, France
- Guangzhou, China
- Hangzhou, China (operates under the name Xizi Otis)
- Kirkby, Merseyside, England (from 1955–2000)
- Madrid, Spain
- Nogales, Mexico
- Puebla, Mexico
- São Bernardo do Campo, Brazil
- Shibayama, Japan
- Tianjin, China
- San Sebastián, Spain
- Shcherbinka, Russia
- St. Petersburg, Russia
- İstanbul, Turkey
- Moscow, Russia (operates under the name "MOS OTIS Service Center", it produces modernization packages and small quantity of non-standard panoramic elevators for Russia, Belarus and Ukraine)
- Kiev, Ukraine
Otis had a factory in Bloomington, Indiana. They still use the offices on the site.
Otis had a factory in Yonkers, New York. It was closed in 1983 and is now a Kawasaki rail car assembly plant.
Otis had a large factory in Harrison, New Jersey, USA.
Otis has a manufacturing facility located in Hatfield, PA that is called CemcoLift Elevators.
Otis has a test tower facility in Bristol, CT and a Service Center in Bloomfield, CT that serve their businesses in North and South America. Other test towers and service centers are located throughout the world.
See also
External links
- Official website
- Poma-Otis official website
- Xizi Otis official website (Chinese)
- Record EU fine for lift 'cartel' - BBC News, 21 February 2007 (Otis was fined 225 million euros for involvement)
References
- ^ [1], UTC Fact Sheet[dead link]
- ^ [2], Otis Marks 150th Anniversary of the Modern Elevator April 1, 2003.[dead link]
- ^ "Pay Raised". Time magazine. December 13, 1926. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,722862-2,00.html. Retrieved 2009-08-18. "The Board of Arbitration met the end of October. On it sat For the railroads: ... For the public: William Delavan Baldwin, chairman, Otis Elevator Co., and Edgar Erastus Clark, onetime (1906-21) I. C. C. commissioner ..."
- ^ New York Times. April 28, 1925. "Otis Elevator Re-elects Board. At the meeting of the Otis Elevator Company yesterday the directors were re-elected. W. D. Baldwin, Chairman of the board, ..."
- ^ "President Elected For Otis Elevator". New York Times. October 26, 1964. http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=FA0B11FB355B1B728DDDAF0A94D8415B848AF1D3. "Fayette S. Dunn The Otis Elevator Company over the weekend the election of Fayette S. Dunn as president and director, succeeding the late Percy L. Douglas. ..."
- ^ "Fayette Dunn, 76, Dies. Otis Elevator's Ex-Head". New York Times. December 12, 1979. http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F40B17F93F5C12728DDDAB0994DA415B898BF1D3. Retrieved 2009-08-18. "Fayette S. Dunn, former president and chairman of the board of the Otis Elevator Company, died yesterday in Dorset, Vt., where he had lived since his ..."
- ^ http://www.cnkeyword.info/officially-recognized-beijing-subway-accident-elevator-design-flaw/
- ^ http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-07-08/china-halts-use-of-otis-escalator-model-after-deadly-accident.html
- ^ http://www.cnkeyword.info/officially-recognized-beijing-subway-accident-elevator-design-flaw/
Categories:- United Technologies Corporation
- Companies established in 1853
- Otis Elevator Company
- Companies based in Hartford County, Connecticut
- Farmington, Connecticut
- Elevator manufacturers
- Hovair people movers
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