The story of our company begins with the story of three pioneers, who laid the foundation for everything you see at NBCUniversal today:
- Carl Laemmle was a German immigrant to the United States, who in the early 1900s saw a future in moving pictures, and began purchasing and building nickelodeon theaters. Soon enough, he was producing his own movies, and in 1912 he founded the Universal Film Manufacturing Company, which would eventually become Universal Pictures.
- David Sarnoff was a young telegraph staffer and a true visionary; in 1915 he pitched to his bosses the idea of bringing wireless radio broadcasts into the home. They ignored his prophetic idea at first, but years later in 1926, while an executive at RCA, he established the National Broadcasting Company, the first radio (and eventually television) network.
- Ralph Roberts, already a successful businessman in the early sixties, saw an opportunity in front of him down in Tupelo, Mississippi. In 1963, he bought a struggling "community antenna television" company, and over the next few years smartly expanded its reach. He eventually turned it into the multi-billion-dollar operation known as Comcast, where he still serves as Founder and Chairman Emeritus to this day.
Because these three men excelled and innovated not just their businesses but the industries they belonged to, today’s NBCUniversal produces and delivers the best content in the world to you, no matter where (or how) you watch.