Prince Tsushinkogyo Co. Ltd.  (Prince Telecommunication and Engineering) was founded in 1950  in Nagoya, Japan. They concentrated on making tuners and solid state musical instrument amplifiers which were sold under the Prince brand names as well as others (such as Memphis). The company began to use the Arion brand name in 1980 and began making guitar effects pedals. The company's fortunes declined in the 1990s and by 1997 Arion was sold to the Ueno Kaihatsu Center, who continued making pedals and tuners, but discontinued the amplifiers.