Unican Security Systems

Last updated
Unican Security Systems Ltd.
IndustryKeys and locks
FoundedMontreal, Quebec (1968 (1968))
FounderAaron M. Fish
DefunctDecember 2000 (2000-12)
Headquarters
Montreal
,
Canada
Website unican.ca

Unican Security Systems Ltd. was a Canada-based company created by Aaron Fish in the 1960s and sold in 2000. At its sale (to Kaba Group), the company had over $800 million in sales annually and was the largest maker of key blanks and key copying machines in the world. [1]

Contents

History

Aaron Fish was born in the 1930s in Montreal, Quebec. He was the Chairman and CEO of Unican Security Systems Ltd. from its creation in 1965 to its sale in December 2000. [2] He worked for his father in his early years as a locksmith. By the time he was 17 and had graduated from high school, he was operating as a key and lock distributor. From 1949 to 1960, Fish became the largest key and lock distributor in Montreal. [3]

In 1960, Bell Canada decided they needed to get away from using keys and had a requirement for a push-button lock. Fish then promptly moved from being a distributor to a developer and created the first push-button lock in North America. In 1964, in an effort to finance his company, Unican, he sold half of the business to private investors.

In 1967, when Fish once again ran out of money, he took his company public to raise a quarter of a million dollars. Over the next 4 years, Unican acquired 5 companies, from die-casting Capitol Industries to key-maker Ilco in Boston. During the 1980s, the company grew exponentially, achieving sales of $100 million annually. In the 1990s, Unican Security Systems supplied locks to the U.S. Pentagon and the United Nations.

By 1999, the company had sales of nearly $500 million annually, making 4.5 million keys each day for automobile companies, hotels, residential, commercial, and the like.

In December 2000, Unican Security Systems was bought out by the Kaba Group of Switzerland for $36.00 a share based on 18 124 000 shares outstanding. Unican's fortunes declined following the 2000 sale as global competition increased. In November 2007, Fish bought back the original east-end Montreal plant where the company began. He began slashing costs and soon returned Capitol Industries Ltd. to profitability. The Montreal Gazette on Sept. 6, 2008, reported that the company now specializes in zinc die-casting and finishing, mainly for metal furniture parts such as door handles.

Fish was responsible for a major change in the key-making and lock industries in North America, Europe, South America, and Asia. Peter Blaikie was a major supporter of the company.

In June 2016, Fish was awarded an honorary doctorate degree from Concordia University [3], making this his first degree since graduating high school.

Aaron Fish passed away on October 1, 2020. [4]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bombardier Inc.</span> Aerospace manufacturer in Canada

Bombardier Inc. is a Canadian business jet manufacturer. Headquartered in Montreal, the company was founded in 1942 by Joseph-Armand Bombardier to market his snowmobiles and became one of the world's biggest producers of aircraft and trains.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bell Canada</span> Canadian telecommunications company

Bell Canada is a Canadian telecommunications company headquartered at 1 Carrefour Alexander-Graham-Bell in the borough of Verdun in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is an ILEC in the provinces of Ontario and Quebec; as such, it was a founding member of the Stentor Alliance. It is also a CLEC for enterprise customers in the western provinces.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Domtar</span> Largest integrated producer of uncoated free-sheet paper in North America

Domtar Corporation is a North American pulp and paper company that manufactures and markets wood fiber-based pulp and paper products. The company operates pulp mills and paper mills in Windsor, Quebec; Dryden, Ontario; Kamloops, British Columbia; Ashdown, Arkansas; Hawesville, Kentucky; Plymouth, North Carolina; Marlboro County, South Carolina; and Kingsport, Tennessee. While Domtar operated independently for several decades and was listed on the Toronto and New York stock exchanges, the company was acquired by Paper Excellence Group in November 2021 and has since operated as a subsidiary.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hydro-Québec</span> Canadian hydroelectric utility

Hydro-Québec is a Canadian Crown corporation public utility headquartered in Montreal, Quebec. It manages the generation, transmission and distribution of electricity in Quebec, as well as the export of power to portions of the Northeast United States. More than 40 percent of Canada’s water resources are in Quebec and Hydro-Québec is the fourth largest hydropower producer in the world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sun Life Building</span> Office in Montreal, Quebec

The Sun Life Building is a historic 122-metre (400 ft), 24-storey office building at 1155 Metcalfe Street on Dorchester Square in the city's downtown core of Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">World Financial Group</span> Multi-level marketing company

World Financial Group (WFG) is a multi-level marketing financial and insurance services company based in Johns Creek, Georgia, a suburb of Atlanta, which sells investment, insurance, and various other financial products through a network of distributors in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It is wholly owned by Dutch life insurance multinational Aegon and operates primarily under the Transamerica brand in the United States.

Transcontinental Inc., operating as TC Transcontinental, is a Montreal-based packaging, commercial printing and specialty media company.

Ernest Leo Kolber, was a Canadian businessman, philanthropist and Senator, serving from 1983 to 2004.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Essendant</span> American office supply distributor

Essendant, formerly known as United Stationers, is a national wholesale distributor of office supplies, with consolidated net sales of $5.3 billion. Essendant stocks over 160,000 items, including traditional office products, office furniture, janitorial and break room supplies, and technology products. Essendant is headquartered in Deerfield, Illinois, and also has operations in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Peter Macfarlane Blaikie is a Canadian lawyer and a bilingual politician from Quebec and founder of Heenan Blaikie.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Home Depot Pro</span> U.S. wholesale distributor

The Home Depot Pro, headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida, is a wholesale distributor and direct marketer of maintenance, repair and operations (MRO) products for non-industrial businesses in the United States. The Home Depot Pro distributes products such as HVAC, janitorial supplies, plumbing supplies, and security supplies.

MDA Ltd. is a Canadian space technology company headquartered in Brampton, Ontario, Canada, that provides geointelligence, robotics and space operations, and satellite systems.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Best Lock Corporation</span> Lock manufacturer

Best Lock Corporation was an American publicly traded door hardware and lock manufacturer. Founded in 1925 as Best Universal Lock Company by Frank Ellison Best, the privately held company relocated from Seattle, Washington, to Indianapolis, Indiana, in 1938, where operations expanded and evolved. Product offerings are now marketed under the Best Access brand, which is one of several trademarked corporate divisions in Stanley Black & Decker's Stanley Security group.

dormakaba

dormakaba Holding AG is a global security group based in Rümlang, Switzerland. It employs more than 15,000 people in over 50 countries. It formed as the result of a merger between former Kaba and former Dorma in September 2015 and is publicly traded on the SIX Swiss Exchange.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Scailex Corporation</span> Israeli company

Suny Cellular Communication was known as Scitex Corporation Ltd. until December 2005 and Scailex Corporation Ltd. until November 2016.

Mircom Technologies Ltd. is a manufacturer and distributor of life safety and communications systems including fire detection & alarm, voice evacuation, controlled access and security solutions. The company is headquartered in Vaughan, Ontario, Canada.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Silca S.p.A.</span>

Silca S.p.A. is a manufacturer of keys, key cutting machines, semi industrial and industrial key cutting machines. Silca S.p.A. is a subsidiary of Kaba Group, a provider of selected segments of the security industry. Kaba Holding AG is listed on the SIX Swiss Stock Exchange and employs around 7,500 people in more than 60 countries. Silca distributes its products all over the world through 130 selected distributors and 8 Business units.

Limited Snowboards was a Canadian snowboard brand founded in Toronto in 1993 by Perry Gladstone and Ricardo Camargo. Limited Snowboards Inc. and its successors distributed snowboards bindings, boots, clothing and accessories under the brands Limited and LTD.

Ronald Andrew Weinberg is an American-born Canadian fraudster and former television producer and businessman best known as the co-founder of the CINAR animation studio, and its co-CEO during a scandal that eventually brought down the company. In 2014, he was charged with 26 counts of fraud in Montreal. Two years later, Weinberg was sentenced to nine years in prison.

References

  1. ↑ Canadian Shareowner , Feb 1999
  2. ↑ Canadian Shareowner
  3. ↑ Aaron M. Fish - Unican Security Systems Ltd (Ucs.T): Twst
  4. ↑ "Aaron Max Fish". www.paperman.com. Paperman & Sons. 2020-10-02. Retrieved 2020-10-02.

Bibliography

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.