It had a long and complicated history. The Concorde design was culled and developed from several competing designs from several companies. At the time of First Flight (1969) Sud Aviation and BAC had both built aircraft; however, SUD Aviation was already in the process of merging with Nord Aviation and SEREB (or whatever that acronym is in French) to form Aerospatiale. By the time of flight in service in 1976, it had become Aerospatiale.

Ironically, it was never intended to be profitable, it was really an exercise to keep up with technology - the British government was convinced the rest of the world would be going supersonic, and if they did not learn the technology they would forever be lost int eh world of aerospace manufacturing. So, saying the airliner was a success or failure is not only dependent on how you view costs and performance and business decisions, but also on what basis you judge it.

From a performance perspective, responding to BOH, yes, the Concorde used reheats only for takeoff, overcoming the sound barrier, and very occasionally go arounds, though this was most often unnecessary. At cruise, the Concorde was actually more efficient than most other comparable airliners (remember the 747 only entered service in 1970) due to both it's design and the fact that it flew fast enough to cover the same distance in a fraction of the time. The problem with the afterburners were that they significantly increased fuel consumption during takeoff and that burst into supersonic flight, which was when the aircraft was consuming the most amount of fuel. Comparatively it was not a bad design - it was the most efficient way to achieve supersonic flight at the time, which was why I say it really was simply a little too early. They also added a lot to both the aircraft cost, but also to maintenance and training. They also added significantly to the noise level, which is what the US leveraged against it.

Personally I think there was a little too much negative reaction to the aircraft. Most of the routes it would fly were over water anyways, so the noise issue was really a red herring. If they used modern materials and technology, they could build a SST that would be efficient.

Sud Aviation, to be correct at the time of the first flight in 1969. By the time the Concorde was in service in 76 it was Aerospatiale. But it's generally referred to as a BAC -Aerospatiale bird, although perhaps not technically correct if you want to refer to development.

Yes it seems you are correct, I had (wrongly) thought the Aerospatiale organisation was formed in the 60s.