In 1951 radio engineer Einar Lagerström founded the company Svenska Elektroinstrument. Einar, with a past as the test head of the army's radio equipment, started a production of Quartz crystals for the management of radio frequencies. At first, the simple production consisted of a gramophone works, glass, abrasive powder and a Quartz disc, which was hand ground to the desired frequency. New staff was recruited and the company grew. Over the past decades, a modern crystal manufacturer emerged and a solid crystal expertise built up in the company. A knowledge that has been very beneficial to kve in our customer support, measure services and evaluation of suppliers. The latter has led to kve today has a wide network of reliable producers of crystal products.

In 1976 the name was changed to Kvartselektronik AB, which took over production of Quartz crystals, which increasingly was supplemented by imports of crystals and oscillators. Import business grew quickly and was linked contacts with many suppliers in Europe, USA and Japan.

In 1980 a cooperation began with TEW, Tokyo Denpa, whose broad range of crystals and high product quality led to that kve in the'80s grew into a leading supplier of crystal components in the Nordic region.

In 1989 we stopped producing our own crystals. Instead, the agency expanded through the purchase of BST Electronic Ltd, with its large crystalline supplier Seiko Epson, whose SMD crystals and oscillators had great feedback on the market.

In 1991 Eklöws electronics department was purchased and kve's product range grew with a series of new components such as inductors, transformers and filters from Toko, resonators from Panasonic, step motors, photoelectric cells, LEDs, etc. In 1995 the product range was broadened further when kve associated with several new suppliers, such as sensors from Nicera, EL-film from Seiko Precision and LEDs from Marl.

In 1996 Kve celebrated 20 years and although we greatly have broadened our product line Quartz components still remains the dominant piece of revenue in kve's product cake. Much has changed in kve over the past 20 years. The small crystal company has grown in both product range and turnover.

1996-1998 was an eventful year for kve. - We formed Kvartselektronik OY, that in January 1998 moved into new premises in Espoo outside Helsinki. - We expanded our premises and purchased an additional test equipment for testing of crystals and oscillators. - We were awarded "most distinguised supplier 1996" by ABB Network Partner. - In 1997 and 1998, we received similar awards from ABB Network Partner, ABB Industrial Systems and from Benefon, Finland.

2001-2002 kve was ISO-certified in 2001 for environment according to 14001:2004 and in 2002 for quality, according to 9001-2000.

2003 the wholly owned subsidiary BST Electronic AB was merged with kve to streamline and reduce administrative costs. Now we have all our suppliers under one roof.

In the future, Kve will along with our competent staff continue to develop the business and serve our very loyal customers.

History