Edison and Swan Electric Light Company Edison and Swan Electric Light Company The Edison and Swan Electric Light Company Limited was a manufacturer of incandescent lamp bulbs and other electrical goods. It was formed in 1883 with the name Edison & Swan United Electric Light Company with the merger of the Swan United Electric Company and the Edison Electric Light Company. Thomas Edison established the Edison Electric Light Company in 1878. Joseph Swan established the Swan United Electric Light Company in 1881. In 1882 the American Edison Company of Thomas Edison sued Swan, claiming infringement of Edison's U.S. patent of 1879; however, they never made it
Thomas Edison was to expand Edison's mathematical methods. Despite the common belief that Edison did not use mathematics, analysis of his notebooks reveal that he was an astute user of mathematical analysis conducted by his assistants such as Francis Robbins Upton, for example, determining the critical parameters of his electric lighting system including lamp resistance by an analysis of Ohm's Law, Joule's Law and economics. Nearly all of Edison's patents were utility patents, which were protected for a 17-year period and included inventions or processes that are electrical, mechanical, or chemical in nature. About a dozen were design patents, which protect an