Magyar Hanglemezgyártó Vállalat (M.H.V.)

The Hungarian state-owned record company of the socialist era (1948-1990) was founded in 1951 under the name Magyar Hanglemezgyártó Vállalat (Hungarian Record Producing Company) and was the only record company in Hungary until 1989 which had permission to issue records. For the first few years of its run there was no fantasy name for the label, so only the name Magyar Hanglemezgyártó Vállalat (or its abbreviation MHV) was used on records. In the mid-1950s they created a label name called Qualiton. First it appeared on the record labels while record sleeves still read MHV. By the end of the 1950s both record sleeves and record labels showed the name Qualiton. Although MHV was the only record company in Hungary, it introduced sub-labels at the end of the 1960s (Pepita, Hungaroton and Qualiton from that time also acting as a sub-label), and many more in the 1980s (Bravo, Profil, Krém, Start, Favorit, Gong). Today the publishing rights belong to Hungaroton Records Kft.