About Matra
Mécanique Avion TRAction or Matra was a French company covering a wide range of activities mainly related to automobile, aeronautics and weaponry which from 1994 was a subsidiary of Lagardère Group and which now operates under that name.
Matra was owned by the Floirat family. The name Matra became famous in the 1960s when it went into car production by buying Automobiles René Bonnet. Matra Automobiles produced racing cars and sports cars, and was very successful in racing.
Lagardère involvement
By merging with various companies Matra CEO Jean-Luc Lagardère built around Matra a group diversified in media, weaponry, high technologies, aeronautics and formerly in automobiles and records production and distribution. Matra was privatized in 1988, with Lagardère holding 6% of the stock and by 1992 25%.
In 1992 the Lagardère Group was radically restructured; acquiring more shares in Matra from Floirat, Daimler Benz and GEC, and Hachette from loirat, Crédit Lyonnais and Aberly. Lagardère merged Matra and Hachette to form Matra Hachette, of which Lagardère Group held 37.6%. Following a share swap in 1994 Lagardère held 93.3% of Matra Hachette’s stock. In 1996 Matra Hachette was formally merged into Lagardère.
Matra Hautes Technologies
Matra Hautes Technologies (Matra High Technology) or MHT was the defence arm of Matra. The company was involved in aerospace, defence and telecommunications. In February 1999 Matra Hautes Technologies merged with Aérospatiale to form Aérospatiale-Matra. On July 10, 2000 Aérospatiale-Matra became part of EADS.
Divisions (as of aérospatiale merger)
- Matra Défense
- Matra Systèmes & Information
- Matra BAe Dynamics (50% British Aerospace)
Formed in 1996, Matra BAe Dynamics brought together the missile business of BAe (BAe Dynamics) and half of the missile business of Matra Défense. (The other half remained as Aerospatiale Matra Missiles). - Matra Marconi Space (49% GEC)
Matra Espace was the space division of Matra which merged with the space operations of GEC (Marconi Space Systems) in 1989 to form Matra Marconi Space. In 2000, it was merged with the space division of DaimlerChrysler Aerospace AG (DASA) to form Astrium. This was later renamed to EADS Astrium - Matra Nortel Communications (50% Nortel)
