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.

In 1959 Associated Electrical Industries (AEI) created a self-contained company named AEI Traction Division to control the railway activities of both Metropolitan Vickers Electrical Company Ltd and British Thomson-Houston (BTH). Included in this company were the interests of the Metropolitan-Vickers General Railway Signal Co., (later to become GEC General Railway Signal). The newly formed company established its headquarters, at Trafford Park, Manchester, and operated from three other sites, Attercliffe Common in Sheffield, Rugby Works, and Stockton Works supplying traction motors, machines, control gear and mechanical parts of locomotives. AEI Traction Limited’s product range encompassed electric and diesel-electric locomotives; electrical equipment for tramcars, trolley buses, trolley mining locomotives, traction motors and gears. In 1969 AEI Traction Division merged with English Electric Traction to form English Electric-AEI Traction Division.

In 1861 Sir Edward Lumb, a British entrepreneur, requested a concession from the Legislature of the Province of Buenos Aires to build a railway line from Constitucion to Chascomus, 120km away from Buenos Aires, which was granted on June 12th 1862 by President Bartolome Mitre. In 1863, with the support of London shareholders Thomas Duguid, the Fair family, British consul Frank Parish (later Southern’s chairman), and bankers Baring and David Robertson, Buenos Aires Great Southern Railway Ltd. was established. The first general manager of the company was Edward Banfield, the Buenos Aires suburban station of Banfield was named after him when it opened in 1873. Buenos Aires Great Southern Railway had its company headquarters in London, and operated workshops and rolling stock depots in Barracas. The main stations of the Buenos Aires Great Southern Railway are Constitucion, Barracas al Sud, Jeppener, Chascomus, Barracas al Norte, Las Flores, Azul, Dolores and Banfield. In 1877 Buenos Aires Great Southern Railway built a new warehouse in Constitucion station for freight trains and a freight station at Sola in Buenos Aires where repair shops operated for 15 years. By 1884 Buenos Aires Great Southern Railway was the largest in Argentina, with 1,025km of track. In 1901 new workshops were built at Remedios de Escalada, 11km from Constitucion station, being the largest workshop in South America, employing 2700. In 1925, the company took over Bahia Blanca and North Western Railway from Buenos Aires and Pacific Railway Company. By 1930 Buenos Aires Great Southern Railway Company had 8000 km of track, 504 stations, 857 locomotives, 955 carriages, 16,602 coaches and 30,000 employees. The company continued to function until 1948, when President Juan Peron nationalised the Argentine Railway, creating six state owned railway networks. Buenos Aires Great Southern Railway was incorporated into the Ferrocarril General Roca network.

On 9th February 1855, the Imperial Government of Brazil signed a contract with Edward Price for the construction of the first section of a railway. Work commenced on the Central Railway of Brazil on 11th June 1855, and on 29th March 1858, the 48km section from Rio de Janeiro to Freguesia de Nossa Senhora da Conceicao de Marapicu was completed. On March 16, 1957 the company came under the control of Rede Ferroviária Federal S.A. (RFFSA).

The Antofagasta (Chili) and Bolivia Railway Company plc was incorporated in London in 1888. The company raised money on the London Stock Exchange to build and operate a railway from Antofagasta, a port on the Pacific Coast of Northern Chile, to La Paz, the capital of Bolivia. The company diversified into mining and other sectors, following acquisition of control by the Luksic Group in 1980.

The Great Southern Railway of India (SIR) was renamed South Indian Railway on the 1st Jan 1891. SIR together with the Guntakal-Villupuram State Railway formed to become a new company called “South Indian Railway Company Limited”. In April 1951 the railway was integrated into a single zone with Madras and Southern, Marhatta Railway and Mysore Railway to form the Southern Railway zone of Indian Railways.

The Jamaican Government bought the Kingston-Old Harbour railway line from the Jamaica Railway Company in 1879. Rapid development of the citrus and banana industries in the early 1880s significantly encouraged the expansion of the railway in Jamaica. In 1890 the Government sold the railway to an American syndicate, the West India Improvement Company. In 1900 the company went into receivership and the railway became a part of the government once again. In 1960 the government created the Jamaica Railway Corporation to look after the railway. Line closures from debt and pressures to reopen the lines in 1970s occurred until in 1980 Hurricane Allen damaged much of the railway and totally destroyed a section of the Port Antonio line. In October 1992 public rail transport services finally ceased operating in Jamaica. In 2012 the railway service had been mothballed.