Società Generale Semiconduttori
SGS (Società Generale Semiconduttori) was an Italian company that made semiconductor parts, including diodes, transistors and DIP ICs. It was founded in 1957 by Olivetti and Telettra after Mario Tchou, an Olivetti engineer, persuaded Adriano Olivetti to start an Italian electronics company to produce solid‑state devices for Olivetti’s Elea mainframe. The headquarters were in Agrate Brianza, Lombardy.
In 1960 Fairchild Semiconductor bought one third of SGS and a SGS‑Fairchild joint venture was created to use Fairchild’s planar manufacturing technology. The partnership ended in 1968, and Fairchild sold its SGS stake to IRI‑STET, the predecessor of TIM.
In December 1971 SGS merged with another Italian semiconductor company, ATES, to form SGS‑ATES. On 23 April 1985 the company changed its name to SGS Microelettronica. In 1987 SGS Microelettronica merged with Thomson Semiconductors to form SGS‑Thomson, which later became STMicroelectronics in 1998.
This page was last edited on 3 February 2026, at 08:04 (CET).