The English Electric Company was formed on 14th December 1918 and over the following year acquired Dick, Kerr & Company of Preston, Willans & Robinson of Rugby, the Phoenix Dynamo Manufacturing Company of Bradford, and Coventry Ordnance Works. After the First World War the various German owned Siemens works were distributed to different UK companies and in November 1919 English Electric acquired the Siemens Brothers Dynamo Works at Stafford, which became the company headquarters in 1931. Coventry Ordnance, primary output naval guns, did not feature in the gradual product rationalisation which took place between the First World and Second world Wars. Willans & Robinson’s Rugby works specialised in prime movers, steam, hydro and internal combustion, and their Stafford works on power station and distribution electrics, including transformers and large electric machines for applications such as mining and steel works. Dick Kerr & Company continued building equipment and vehicles for bus, tram and railway applications with the Phoenix Dynamo Manufacturing Company concentrating on medium and small electrical machines. Involvement with aircraft continued a small scale. By 1929 the company was in financial trouble and an American syndicate fronted by Lazard Bros. put in new capital. In 1930 Westinghouse of Pittsburgh entered into an agreement with the company for the exchange of technical information relating to steam turbines and electrical apparatus. This cooperation continued into the 1950s. 1930 saw the closure of Preston West works and the transfer of traction electrical design and manufacture to the Phoenix Dynamo Manufacturing works. The Westinghouse influence included top management changes with Sir H Mensforth becoming chairman and George Nelson managing director. Both had been with British Westinghouse at Trafford Park. The early 1930s saw a remarkable improvement in the company’s finances and domestic appliance manufacture was started at Bradford and Stafford. In 1936 they began production of diesel locomotives at Preston and were later involved in the production of the Deltic locomotive for British Rail, presaging the end of steam traction in the UK. Extensive shadow factory building for war production commenced in the late 1930’s, including at Preston East works and Salmesbury for aircraft production and at East Lancashire Road, Liverpool for D. Napier aero engines. A large variety of military equipment built during the war included thousands of Cromwell tanks from Stafford and over 3000 Handley Page Hampden and Halifax bombers from Preston and Salmesbury. After the war manufacture of smaller products from Bradford and Stafford moved to the large Liverpool works. This included electrical distribution transformers, switchgear, fuse gear, fractional horsepower motors and domestic appliances. Napier’s continued engine manufacture with the development of the ’Deltic’ diesel engine, mainly for marine applications. The nearby Netherton works took over the manufacture of large hydro-electric turbines and generators from Willans and Stafford. In 1942 English Electric acquired D. Napier & Son Ltd and Marconi in 1946. The company went on to extend their railway interests with the acquisition of the Vulcan Foundry and Robert Stephenson and Hawthorn Ltd in 1955. The company tried to take over The General Electric Company (GEC) in 1960 but failed. Traction manufacture, but not the offices, moved back to Preston East works and ‘K’, ‘RK’ and ‘V’ engine design and manufacture moved from Willans to Preston West works which was now also used for locomotive building. Kidsgrove works in Stafford made industrial controls and for a while was a major player in the UK computer industry, merging with Leo Computers and then into ICL. Train performance calculations were an early user of the mid-fifties ‘Deuce’ computer. Preston also became a major player in the aircraft industry taking over the wartime RAF/USAF base at Warton aerodrome - major design and manufacture contracts included Canberra bombers and Lightning fighters. Rationalisation in the 1960s resulted in English Electric Aviation becoming 40% of the new British Aircraft Corporation. In 1961 English Electric took over Dorman Diesels Ltd which in turn had acquired W. G. Bagnall Ltd. In 1966 English Electric Diesels merged with Ruston and Hornsby which already included Paxmans. This company eventually became GEC Diesels. Elliott Automation was acquired in 1967. The following year GEC took over English Electric, ending its independent existence.

The Vulcan Foundry was originally opened in 1830 at Newton-le-Willows, as Charles Tayleur and Company. It initially produced girders for bridges, switches and crossings, and other ironwork following the opening of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. Robert Stephenson became a partner in 1832, and in the same year, the first locomotives ‘Tayleur’ and ‘Stephenson’ were delivered to the North Union Railway. By 1840 locomotives had been delivered to five European countries and to North America. The company became The Vulcan Foundry Company in 1847 and acquired limited liability in 1864. From the beginning of 1898, the name changed again to The Vulcan Foundry Limited, dropping the word 'company.' Vulcan locomotives were exported all over the world, with the first locomotives for Russia and Japan supplied in 1837 and 1871 respectively and a long association with India began in 1852. First World War production included shells, gun mountings and mine sweeping equipment. The first non-steam locomotive, an electric, was produced for India in 1929. The first diesel locomotive design commenced in 1932/33 and an agreement was reached with A/S Frichs in Denmark. The English Electric 6K engine was used from this time. The “Waltzing Matilda” tank was developed in 1938 and produced in large numbers and over five hundred ‘Austerity’ steam locomotives were produced for the War Department. Other wartime production included gun mountings and torpedo parts. In 1944 Vulcan acquired the locomotive business, Robert Stephenson & Hawthorns Ltd, based in Newcastle-upon-Tyne. In 1946 the company began working with the English Electric Company producing diesel and electric locomotives and became part of the English Electric Group in 1955. All locomotive building from Preston was transferred to Vulcan Foundry and Robert Stephenson’s in Darlington. Under the new ownership, the works produced many locomotives for both domestic and foreign railways, notably the Deltic. The mid-sixties saw the ‘RK’/’V’ engine production at Preston moved to Vulcan and Ruston & Hornsby Ltd merged with English Electric Diesels in 1966. After the General Electric Company plc (GEC) takeover in 1968 the Ruston name was used for some time inside what became GEC Diesels Ltd in 1975. Engine production and development continued for locomotive, industrial and marine applications until after the GEC-Alsthom merger in 1989. The company took over Mirlees Engines, Stockport in 1997 and was renamed Alstom Engines Ltd.

In 1937 Robert Stephenson & Co. Ltd purchased the locomotive department of R & W Hawthorn Leslie & Co. Ltd. They became Robert Stephenson and Hawthorns Ltd. The policy was to concentrate the building of main line locomotives at Robert Stephenson’s Darlington works and industrial locomotives at Forth Banks. In 1944 Vulcan Foundry acquired Robert Stephenson and Hawthorns Ltd, ending Hawthorns' 137 year connection with Forth Banks. In 1955 Vulcan Foundry became full members of the English Electric group of companies, which became part of the GEC group of companies in 1968.

The Drewry Car Co Ltd was registered on 27 November 1906 in London located at Herne Hill Works and relocated to new works at Somerset Road, Teddington from 1907-1908. In 1911 a working agreement was made between Baguley-Cars Ltd (1911) with the Drewry Car Company Ltd. for the manufacture of internal combustion engine railcars. From 1930 a lot of Drewry locomotives were built by English Electric companies. In 1961 the company manufactured railway vehicles, specialising in diesel operated rail traction cars. In 1962 Drewry acquired a controlling interest in what had become E E Baguley Ltd, and formed Baguley-Drewry Ltd in 1987, once again building its own locomotives, in Burton-on-Trent.

GEC Traction (GECT) was formed in 1972 as part of the GEC Power Engineering Group following earlier amalgamations of the traction divisions of the General Electric Company (GEC), the English Electric Company (EE) and Associated Electrical Industries (AEI). A wholly owned subsidiary company of GEC, the company had offices and works, located at Trafford Park in Manchester, at Strand Road in Preston, and at Attercliffe Common, Sheffield. The headquarters of GEC Traction was Trafford Park, Manchester (previously the headquarters of English Electric-AEI Traction) with design of rotating machines at Preston and Sheffield, and manufacturing activities for control equipment at Manchester and Preston. GEC Traction designed and manufactured a full range of traction machines and control equipment for electric vehicles, including electric locomotives and multiple unit trains for main-line and mass-transit railway systems (dc up to 3,000 volts, and ac up to 50,000 volts), diesel-electric locomotives and trains, mining and industrial locomotives, tramcars and trolleybuses. GEC Traction was the leading supplier of traction equipment in the UK and had a wide market around the world, particularly in South Africa, Australasia, Hong Kong, South Korea, South America and Pakistan. In 1979 the Industrial Locomotive Division of the former English Electric which was based at Vulcan Works, Newton-le-Willows was merged into GEC Traction, which later became a separate company, GEC Industrial Locomotives Ltd. During the late 1980s and 1990s the firm underwent major rationalisation, involving closure of several sites including Attercliffe Common in Sheffield in 1985 and the company’s headquarters at Trafford Park in Manchester in 1998. The company name GEC Traction endured until a merger with the French Alsthom group in 1989, which created GEC Alsthom Traction, which was still a branch of the main company GEC Alsthom.

Sudan Railways is the main railway system in Sudan, operated by the government-owned Sudan Railways Corporation. It runs over 5000km of narrow gauge, single-track railroads that serve the northern and central parts of the country. The main line underwent construction in 1875, completed in 1899, and runs from Wadi Halfa to Khartoum, and southwest to Al Ubayyid via Sannar and Kosti. In 1904-5 a line between Swakin and Atbara was constructed with the two lines meeting at Saloom station, to facilitate export and import transportation. In 1906 the railway headquarters and workshops were moved from Wadi Halfa to Atbara, and since 1981 the company headquarters have been based in Khartoum. In the 1980’s Sudan Railways declined due to political instability and debt, with lines operating at only 20% capacity by 1989. In 2011-2012 a contract was signed to build a line from Nyala to Chad, extending to the capital of Chad, N’Djamena. In 2015 Sudan Railways had 60 trains available but which could only travel at 40km per hour due to poor track conditions, with President Omer Hassan al-Bashir promising modernisation of the Sudanese railways with Chinese funding.

In 1929 Vickers Ltd and Cammell Laird merged their rolling stock activities in a new company, the Metropolitan-Cammell Carriage, Wagon and Finance Company Ltd with Vickers and Cammell Laird each holding 50% of the shares of the new company. Following the Second World War, the company manufactured carriages for the railways of the world, including UK, USA, Canada, South Africa, Hong Kong, Singapore, Brazil, Jamaica, and Egypt. In addition, the company manufactured mineral wagons, diesel multiple units and locomotives. However, over this period of sustained high output, international industrial development together with reductions in home market demand as orders were fulfilled, led to the necessity to reduce capacity and in 1962 the Saltley Works were closed and eventually the whole enterprise was concentrated at the Midland Works offices at Leigh Road, Washwood Heath. In the 1970s Metro-Cammell specialised in the design and construction of rapid transit vehicles for customers such as London Underground, Tyne and Wear Metro, Hong Kong Mass Transit Corporation and the Kowloon Canton Railway Corporation. They also built Maglev vehicles for Birmingham Airport, diesel multiple units for BR and Mk IV coaches for BR. In May 1989 the Laird Group sold their transportation interests to GEC Alsthom and Metro-Cammell became part of the new Anglo-French Power Generation and Transportation Group. This led to involvement in the construction of the Eurostar trains for the Channel Tunnel project. The name Metro Cammell disappeared forever in 1998 when the owners floated the company under the name Alstom.