Although the name of the company may be unfamiliar to most people, the constituent companies of its recent history, notably Alstom Power Conversion.
Parts of the British General Electric Company plc merged with parts of Compagnie Générale d'Electricité (now Alcatel-Lucent) in 1989 to form CEGELEC, part of GEC Alsthom. Also in the same year, the German Allgemeine Elektrizitäts-Gesellschaft (AEG) had merged with the American Westinghouse Drive Systems.
In 1995, these two conglomerates merged to form CEGELEC Industrial Systems Group. In 1999, it changed its name to Alstom Power Conversion, then on 10 November 2005, it became a separate company from Alstom.