Im Up Front Littlefuse

Image of gray fuse encircled by black text on yellow background.

Established in 1927, Littelfuse is a manufacturer of “technologies in circuit protection, power control, and sending.” Their technology is used for many different professions and tasks, and their products can be found in TVs, computers, cars, airplanes, etc. The company has twenty-two locations in North and South America, twelve locations in Europe, and nineteen locations in Europe. In 2019 they employed eleven thousand people, had more than fifty buildings, and made 1.5 billion dollars. The company became an independent corporation in Illinois in 1991.

Littelfuse, the company name, is spelled that way due to copyright issues when Edward V. Sundt was establishing the company in 1927, as the name Little fuse was considered too common. Sundt sold his car when he was twenty-seven years old to gain the money to start the company. His first product he patented was a small, quick fuse that was used to keep test meters from burning out. Later, during World War II, the company focused on circuit protection for aviation and communications, and then in the 1960s the company became involved in the space exploration industry. Littelfuse started working with micro-circuitry, and two subminiature fuse lines were used in the Gemini spaceflight. The next highlight of the company's innovation was their involvement in computers during the 1970s, when computer usage greatly increased. 

A fuse is included in circuits in electronic devices, and a fuse's job is to break the circuit’s flow of power if the current is too high so that short circuits do not cause damage to electronic products.