it was today I learned, that in 1990 or so, Pyrotronics, and Gamewell (whose systems are popular in New England which where I’m from, merged to form Cerberus Pyrotronics, as I read this while browsing the archive of fire alarm ads on Google Drive. here’s the link
Good find! Pyrotronics was already a division of Cerberus Technologies, Inc. (which was likely related to Cerberus AG of Switzerland) as the Pyrotronics card says though, but now I guess we know the exact year & reason Gamewell was part of Cerberus Pyrotronics for a while (from what I’ve read Honeywell apparently later bought Gamewell from Cerberus Pyrotronics in 2003 & then merged them with FCI in 2005 to form the current “Gamewell-FCI”). Also interesting how Cerberus’s, well, cerberus logo, was added alongside the word “PYROTRONICS” in Pyrotronic’s logo.
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Wow thats an awesome find there man! I love old cerberus stuff
Nah i’m pretty sure gamewell was privately owned in the late 90s; the cerberus group logo was gone in the late 90’s
Oh, okay: who do you suppose went in between Cerberus Pyrotronics & Honeywell in Gamewell’s list of owners?
A private owner; its not known who that owner was
Gamewell and Pyrotronics merged in 1989 and Gamewell left in 1990. I think the “Cerberus Pyrotronics INS-2” mentioned in this thread was actually the Gamewell INS-2 sold under the Cerberus Pyrotronics brand before Gamewell left.
Wait what? Does that mean that Gamewell-Cerberus Pyrotronics equipment was only made in 1989 & no other year? (& thus is incredibly rare as a result)
I know that panel was sold under both Cerberus Pyrotronics & Gamewell, but who originally made it I have no idea.
Probably. The author of the post I linked could not find any information on the Cerberus Pyrotronics INS-2 besides the fact that it was referenced in the IXL documentation.
This ad shows Gamewell advertising the system without the Cerberus Pyrotronics brand, so it was probably originally by Gamewell. I think the IXL was a modified version compatible with Pyrotronics equipment, since some IXL components used the INS name.
Interestingly, there’s another ad for the INS-2 (from 1990) that features Cerberus Pyrotronics branding at the bottom of the page but advertises Gamewell-branded products. I wonder if the intention was to keep using the Gamewell brand on certain products or to gradually phase it out in favour of the Cerberus Pyrotronics brand.
I noticed that this ad from 1987 mentions “a division of Baker Industries, Inc.” under the Pyrotronics logo while this ad from 1988 mentions “a division of Cerberus Technologies, Inc.” beneath the logo.
Similarly to what Cerberus did in its 1989 and 1990 ads, Siemens published an ad in 1999 announcing its acquisition of Cerberus Pyrotronics.
Where did you find that? I was recently trying to find out some of the history of Gamewell and FCI, and I really didn’t get very far in doing so.
Here are the sources I could find just now of Honeywell International, Inc.'s 2003 takeover of The Gamewell Company (one of which might have been where I originally learned such from):
Honeywell acquires The Gamewell Co. | Security Systems News
Honeywell acquires Gamewell | Security Systems News
Honeywell Acquires Gamewell Co.; Product Line Is No. 5 Under Fire Systems Group - Security Sales & Integration
The Gamewell Co. - Crunchbase Company Profile & Funding
Gamewell M-69’s - Fire Alarm General Discussion - The Fire Panel Forums
Ashland firm acquired by Honeywell - Boston Business Journal (bizjournals.com)
Group eyes purchase of building (milforddailynews.com)
ena-vm02-07-2003.pdf (vantage.com)
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Cerberus pyrotronics made an MXL compatible century pull called the “ ms-mi “ i’m pretty sure the MXL came out in 1995; that pull was mentioned an a siemens document about the mxl
According to multiple sources the MXL was introduced in 1992 & lasted until 2013: that’s still after the very short-lived Gamewell-Cerberus Pyrotronics partnership/alliance would have ended however.
Either the patent for the century expired or gamewell gave cerberus pyrotronics permission to produce the ms-mi
It’s a rebrand. I think I remember seeing a picture where the “Cerberus Pyrotronics” sticker fell off to reveal the Gamewell branding printed into the housing.
Yes; the logo is riveted on. However on the canadian cerberus pyrotronics century, theres no gamewell logo behind the cerberus pyrotronics logo
It looks like there was a patent infringement lawsuit between Baker and Cerberus in the 1980s over the DI-3 detectors, which were originally by Cerberus. This may have led to Cerberus acquiring Pyrotronics from Baker.
Very interesting indeed: had no idea how Pyrotronics went from Baker Industries to Cerberus like that (I know Cerberus & Pyrotronics were once independent but how they became related I didn’t know). We still don’t know when exactly Pyrotronics was founded (& thus how far they go back) or when they were supposedly taken over by Baker though I think.
That document is very confusing: first it says that Cerberus supposedly both gladly & willingly gave Baker permission to manufacture their DI-3 smoke detector for sale in North America, but then accused Baker of in fact not having permission to make it yet making it anyway almost a decade later! (not only that but they seem to be calling their own detector “technically unsound, unsafe and inferior,”! (unless they were referring to Baker’s/Pyrotronics’ version specifically, even though it doesn’t seem like they were)
On a somewhat-related note, any idea if Pyrotronics (& maybe by extension the “Pyr-A-Larm” & “Pyr-A-Lon” brand names) was once their own company or if they were instead simply a brand name used by Baker Industries? (though given Pyrotronics seemingly became part of the new Cerberus Pyrotronics in 1988 that would point to the former, & that Baker simply acquired them at some point along the way)
I think Cerberus gave permission for Baker to produce other detectors (possibly including the DI-4A and DI-7L, which have ads in this folder).
The first note at the end reads “The 1973 agreement supersedes an exclusive licensing agreement entered into by the parties’ predecessors in interest on Jan. 17, 1951.” This 1956 ad is the earliest Pyrotronics ad I found, and it is still a division of Baker at this point, together with the “Cerberus licensed” Pyr-A-Larm.
It seems that Pyrotronics has always been a division of Baker, which itself was split from another part of Pyrene-C-O-Two. I have not heard of any other divisions of Baker that would have formed at this time, but it is also possible that Cerberus acquired the entirety of Baker when acquiring Pyrotronics.