page_title: North American Phonograph Company
section_title: Patent challenges
hierarchical_section_title: North American Phonograph Company / Background / Patent challenges
caption_attribution_description: English: Edison Exhibition Phonograph, 1893
context_page_description: The North American Phonograph Company was an early attempt to commercialize the maturing technologies of sound recording in the late 1880s and early 1890s. Though the company was largely unsuccessful in its goals due to legal, technical and financial problems, it set the stage for the modern recording industry in the mid 1890s.
context_section_description: Before Lippincott could establish these sub-companies, the Edison Speaking Phonograph Company, who held Edison's tinfoil phonograph patents, threatened legal action against North American, claiming rights to Edison's improvements to the phonograph until 1912. Lippincott settled with the company, spending hundreds of thousands of dollars that were intended for capital investment.
  In early 1889, thirty regional sub-companies were formed, and licensed exclusive territorial rights from North American. To fund manufacture, Lippincott also needed to sell stock in the parent company, but investors were wary due to the news of the Edison Speaking Phonograph Company's protests.
  Throughout 1889, manufacture of phonograph and graphophones was limited by North American's lack of capital. Local companies found that the few machines they leased were unreliable and hard to use. Some companies found that it was more profitable to publicly exhibit entertainment recordings (music, stories, jokes) than to rent the machines.
caption: Edison Exhibition Phonograph
exif: {}