During the 1970s, Thomson-CSF received its first major contract in the Middle Eastern market. In this period the company diversified into several new sectors, leading to it manufacturing backend telephony equipment, semiconductors and medical imaging apparatus. By the early 1980s Thomson-CSF was in a weak financial position with a high level of debt. While it possessed a diversified portfolio of businesses, its market share within the majority of these many sectors was viewed as being too small to be realistically profitable despite increasing business from overseas buyers.