. meade instruments corporation type subsidiary founded 1972 headquarters irvine california usa key people victor aniceto ceo 1 john elwood cfo owner ningbo sunny electronic co. ltd website meade.com the meade instruments corporation also shortened to meade is an american multinational company headquartered in irvine california that manufactures imports and distributes telescopes binoculars spotting scopes microscopes ccd cameras and telescope accessories for the consumer market . 2 it is the world s largest manufacturer of telescopes . 3 besides selling under its meade brand name the company sells solar telescopes under the coronado name . its products are also imported and sold in europe by a former subsidiary under the meade and coronado brand names . 4 contents 1 origins and history 2 products 2.1 catadioptric cassegrains 2.1.1 acf telescopes 2.1.2 maksutov telescopes 2.2 newtonian telescopes 2.3 goto telescopes 2.4 solar telescopes 2.5 other products 2.6 telescope accessories 3 meade lawsuit 4 financial problems 5 references 6 external links origins and history edit founded in 1972 by john diebel meade started as a mail order seller of small refracting telescopes and telescope accessories manufactured by the japan based towa optical manufacturing company . 3 meade started manufacturing its own line of products in 1976 introducing 6 and 8 reflecting telescopes models in 1977 . in 1980 the company ventured into the schmidt cassegrain market that up to that time had been dominated by celestron corporation . 3 meade has a long history of litigation with other companies over infringement of their patents particularly with its once bitter rival celestron . in august 2008 meade modified their line of schmidt cassegrain telescopes with changes to the optical surfaces in design they call advanced coma free optics acf optics . 5 past production sites include 16542 millikan avenue in irvine which was used in the 1990s . meade production was consequently moved to a new build plant in 6001 oak canyon located as well in irvine . the oak canyon plant was in use for about a decade until 2009 after which production was moved to an expanded plant in tijuana mexico . 6 7 in october 2013 meade instruments merged with ningbo sunny electronic co. ltd a chinese manufacturer and joseph lupica became ceo of meade . 8 in february 2015 victor aniceto succeeded lupicia as president . 1 products edit a 16 40.64 cm meade lx200 in the york university observatory products produced by meade include 9 10 catadioptric cassegrains edit acf telescopes edit acf advanced coma free is an altered version of the meade s previous schmidt cassegrain telescopes that replaces the traditional spherical schmidt cassegrain secondary mirror with a hyperbolic secondary mirror . in the new design the full aperture corrector is slightly altered in shape and combined with a spherical primary mirror . 11 meade s literature originally describe their acf as a variation on the ritchey chr tien telescope although it does not use the two hyperbolic mirror combination in that design being more of an aplantic design . 12 after a legal settlement meade dropped the claim . citation needed models lx90 acf 8 to 12 13 lx200 acf a series of lx200 with acf optics 8 to 16 14 lx400 acf 16 to 20 f 8 w robotic equatorial mount 15 lx800 16 maksutov telescopes edit the meade etx series maksutov cassegrain telescope 105mm aperture . meade currently produces a line of maksutov telescopes under their etx series everybody s telescope . they were first produced in 90 mm 3 1 2 maksutov cassegrain telescope in 1996 . they range in size from 90 mm to 125 mm . newtonian telescopes edit schmidt newtonian telescopes 6 to 10 inches . lightbridge dobsonian telescopes currently 8 10 12 and a 16 inch model meade model 4504 4.5 114mm equatorial reflecting telescope goto telescopes edit many meade telescope lines are classified by the self aiming computerized alt azimuth and equatorial mounts they come on a technology commonly called a goto mount . models lxd75 including newtonian schmidt newtonian advanced coma free and achromatic refractor telescopes etx ls a 150mm 6 in f 10 acf telescope on a single fork arm . ds 2000 series 80mm 3.1 refractor 114mm 4.5 and 130mm 5.1 reflector on altazimuth goto mounts lx80 etx 70 solar telescopes edit in 2004 meade acquired coronado filters from founder and designer david lunt 17 18 who produce an extensive range of specialty telescopes that allow views of the sun in hydrogen alpha and formerly at calcium k line wavelengths . the meade coronado telescopes are called solarmax 40 or higher depending on the model . coronado personal solar telescope other products edit achromatic refractors 5 and 6 inch meade also sells under the meade name imported low to moderate cost reflectors and refractors intended for the beginner retail market . telescope accessories edit accessories produced by meade include the series 5000 eyepieces that are comparable in construction to those of chester new york based tele vue optical s nagler 82 degree field of view panoptic 68 degree field of view and radian 60 degree field of view eyepieces . meade sells deep sky and lunar digital imagers for telescopes . they also market the mysky & mysky plus multi media gps devices guiding users to the sky similar to the competing celestron skyscout . meade lawsuit edit in november 2006 plaintiffs including star instruments and rc optical systems manufacturers of traditional ritchey chr tien optics and telescopes filed a civil lawsuit against meade several dealerships and other individuals in federal court new york southern district . the complaint was against meade advertising their rcx400 and lx200r models as ritchey chr tien . the plaintiffs claimed these models did not use true ritchey chr tien optics and therefore meade and its retailers were committing false advertising infringing on the plaintiff s market . 19 in january 2008 meade settled with a small amount paid to the plaintiffs and the requirement to rename the affected products not using any initials that might suggest ritchey chr tien . 20 on september 27 2006 finkelstein thompson & loughran filed a class action lawsuit against meade . the complaint alleged that throughout the class period defendants misrepresented and omitted material facts concerning meade s backdating of stock option grants to two of its officers . 21 a settlement of 2 950 000 was reached in december 2007 . financial problems edit meade has had financial problems in the past and has survived with the help of its founder john diebel purchasing back the company . 22 however meade in the past few years has run into another round of financial woes since diebel sold the company again . the previous ceo since may 2006 steve muellner 23 had announced various bad news for the company since he had the lead role for meade . meade s irvine california manufacturing plant was closed with manufacturing moved to a new plant in mexico and a majority of the administrative positions were cut . 24 25 meade s customer service line has also been affected by the move to mexico including shorter operating hours and the elimination of the callback option . 26 27 meade is also looking at other options for the uncertain future of the company . 28 29 no matter what the future was holding for the company muellner and some of the board members signed an agreement to cover themselves financially . 30 in april 2008 meade sold two of its three non telescope product brands weaver redfield to two companies for a total of 8 million . however as compensation for divestiture of these two brands out going vp of sales robert davis received a 100 000 bonus from the company . 31 32 on june 13 2008 meade sold their last non telescope brand simmons to bushnell for 7.25 million . 33 34 also in 2008 meade s stock value fell below one dollar bringing up the possibility of meade being delisted from the stock exchange . 35 on october 3 2008 meade eliminated donald finkle s senior vice president position with the company providing him with one year of salary as severance and certain other benefits . 36 meade announced on january 29 2009 that it had sold meade europe its european subsidiary for 12.4 million dollars thus relieving much of meade s debt . however that reduced the company s assets greatly . 37 further changes and unknown stability of the company was announced on february 5 2009 with the resignation of steve muellner chairman of the board harry casari and fellow board member james chadwick . former ceo steven murdock was reinstated as meade ceo . 38 on march 5 2009 the company announced the resignation of cfo paul ross and the assumption of the position by john elwood . with his resignation ross receives a severance in the lump sum of 260 000 . 39 during the summer of 2009 meade announced a 20 1 reverse stock split in hopes of raising the value of their stock . 40 by monday july 8 2013 meade instruments was tipping their hand on whether to recommend selling the company to a chinese co. or a san jose venture capital firm plow ahead alone or possibly seek bankruptcy protection . 41 in september 2013 sunny optics inc a unit of the chinese firm ningbo sunny electronic co ltd completed the acquisition of the entire share capital of meade . references edit a b victor aniceto directory listing . bloomberg.com . bloomberg . retrieved september 2 2016 . intellectual property by gordon v. smith russell l. parr page 167 . google books . retrieved november 20 2011 . a b c fundinguniverse.com meade instruments corporation . fundinguniverse.com . retrieved november 20 2011 . meade instruments announces sale of meade europe operations for gross cash proceeds of us 12.4 million retrieved jan 29 2009 after 27 years of continuous production meade drops schmidt cassegrain optics biotech week august 27 2008 encyclopedia.com archive dead link http www.grandeye.com.hk old factory.htm tour the new meade mexico manufacturing facility . meade.com . retrieved november 20 2011 . meade instruments corp. completes merger agreement with affiliates of ningbo sunny electronic co. ltd. retrieved december 14 2013 meade telescopes meade mead telescopes by meade meade instruments . meade.com . retrieved november 20 2011 . meadescopes.net ; the optical history of meade telescopes rod mollise choosing and using a new cat getting the most from your schmidt cassegrain page 65 . google books . retrieved november 20 2011 . rod mollise choosing and using a new cat getting the most from your schmidt cassegrain page 59 . google books . retrieved november 20 2011 . lx90 series . meade.com . retrieved november 20 2011 . lx200 acf series . meade.com . retrieved november 20 2011 . durango skies lx400 acf 20 f 8 w uhtc on max mount w tripod lx800 series meade instruments telescopes solar telescopes accessories telescopes by meade . meade.com . retrieved november 20 2011 . tresch richard january 18 2005 . sky & telescope david lunt 1942 2005 . skyandtelescope.com . retrieved november 20 2011 . david lunt biography solar filter designer tom s astronomy blog blog archive the meade lawsuit archived november 3 2010 at the wayback machine . meade instruments star instruments and rc optical systems agree to settlement financial news yahoo finance archived march 9 2008 at the wayback machine . class action lawsuit against meade instruments inc. . sep 27 2006 . company seven meade instruments company history page . company7.com . retrieved november 20 2011 . meade instruments corp mead.o officers & directors stocks reuters.com . stocks.us.reuters.com . retrieved november 20 2011 . meade instruments to cut 120 jobs . reuters . november 1 2007 . retrieved november 20 2011 . meade moves production to mexico dead link meade instruments corporation contact information . meade.com . retrieved november 20 2011 . meade customer service phone