Electrotyping was used for general purpose type manufacture in the nineteenth century, but was a somewhat disreputable process, leading to some typefounders disdaining it (or at least claiming to). This was because it could just as easily be used to pirate another company's type as an original design. (It was also used to revive older typefaces in cases where original punches had not survived but matrices or type had, and so sometimes for licensed copying of typefaces in order to send matrices to other countries.)