Daimler History: The Gottlieb Daimler was a famous German engine designer who licensed his name to a variety of German and British companies. The British Daimler company has no relationship to the German company that produced the Mercedes-Benz.
Frederick Simms started the British Daimler company when he purchased a license to build Daimler's engine under the name Daimler Motor Syndicate Ltd. in 1893. In 1895 it became the British Motor Syndicate and in 1897 the Daimler Motor Company, who produced Daimler cars. Daimlers were the first production cars built in England and were used to transport British Royalty until 1950, when Rolls-Royce was given the honor.
British Daimler built engines and military vehicles under the Birmingham Small Arms Company (BSA) name during the war years. Jack Sangster sold Triumph to BSA in 1951 and Jaguar bought Daimler in 1960. Jaguar merged with the British Motor Corporation in 1966 and Ford bought Jaguar and the Daimler name in 1989. Ford introduced the Daimler Super Eight in 2005.
