The story
Founded by TPG Nambiar in 1963.1
British Physical Laboratories India Pvt. Ltd. was founded in 1963, during the Licence Raj, by T. P. Gopalan Nambiar in Palakkad, Kerala, as a company for manufacturing hermetically sealed precision panel meters for the defence forces. Nambiar had worked in the United Kingdom and United States, and when he returned to India, he desired to create a company that manufactured high-quality electronic products, and he wanted to make BPL a household name. The initial products were precision measuring instruments such as hermetic sealed panel meters for Bharat Electronics as a subcontract for Indian Army. The newly founded company was joint venture with the British company of the same name.
Then BPL expanded its medical product ranges to include electrocardiographs and patient-monitoring systems. After the 1982 Asian Games, BPL expanded its range further and manufactured colour televisions and video cassette recorders, and later refrigerators, batteries and other consumer electrical equipment.
The company headquarters was moved to Dynamic House, Church Street, Bangalore. From medical electronics, it expanded into consumer electronics, telecommunications, soft energy and electronic components.
1980s
From 1980 onwards, when the industrial licensing was relaxed, BPL began manufacturing televisions and telecommunications equipment, demonstrating its potential and future business area. It began collaborating with the Japanese Sanyo Electric Company in the early 1980s with a technology-transfer agreement. In the early 1990s, after globalisation and liberalization of the Indian economy, competition entered the market. BPL retained its strong presence and growth rate. During the late 1990s, the company's annual revenue peaked at ₹4,300 crore (equivalent to ₹210 billion or US$2.2 billion in 2026).
BPL concentrated on importing technology, improving product quality, innovations and manufacturing of electronic products. In late 1980s, BPL had metamorphosed from an entrepreneurial venture, into India's biggest consumer electronics & telecommunication company.
Following economic liberalisation in India in 1991, BPL faced increased competition from South Korean companies LG and Samsung. Internal disputes within the controlling family took away attention from external threats, and the company's fortunes declined. By 2004, BPL and Sanyo were facing serious financial problems due to intense competition in the global electronics market. In 2005, the companies announced a joint-venture, and BPL transferred its colour television business, then worth US$80 million, to the new venture.
BPL was restructured with a focus on energy, healthcare, consumer electronics and home security systems. In 2015, BPL partnered with Flipkart as an online retailer. In 2016, BPL launched new LED TVs (32 Inch, 40 inch and more) with a very economical price through E-commerce websites like Flipkart and Amazon.
From Wikipedia’s article on BPL Group, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.5