Confusingly, the name Daimler is used by two completely separate groups of car manufacturers. The history of both companies can be traced back to the German engineer Gottlieb Daimler, who patented an engine design in the late 19th century, built (together with Wilhelm Maybach) the first motorcycle in 1885 and built the first four-wheeled car in 1889. This was the origin of the Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft ("Daimler Motors Company") which built cars from the 1890s onwards and sold licenses of its designs and patents to others. The licence granted to the Daimler Motor Company included the right to use the Daimler name in Great Britain. Gottlieb Daimler died in 1900, having sold licences to use the Daimler name in a number of countries. Emil Jellinek had legal problems selling German Daimlers in France and put it to Daimler Germany that he would put in a large order if they would make a car to order for him bearing his daughter's name. These cars proved enormously popular. Daimler Germany now realised the problem of having sold licences to use the Daimler name, and to avoid any further confusion and licensing troubles, the name Mercedes was adopted for all the cars built by Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft itself, in 1902, while the name Daimler was last used for a German built car in 1908.
In 1924, the Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft merged with Karl Benz's Benz & Cie. to form the Daimler-Benz car company which built Mercedes-Benz cars and trucks and agreed to remain together until 2000. In 1998 Daimler-Benz merged with the Chrysler Corporation to form DaimlerChrysler. During 2007, DaimlerChrysler split itself again, to become the new Chrysler LLC and a renamed Daimler AG.
Through all of this, Ford - via their 1989 purchase of Jaguar - assumed and retained the sole rights to sell automobiles under the Daimler name. However, during 2007 it was revealed that Ford intended to sell off the remaining British-derived portions of its Premier Automobile Group (consisting of both Land Rover and Jaguar holdings, which include the Daimler franchise). The new suitor in this plan is reported to be Tata Motors of India, though Ford prefers to refer to Tata as the "preferred bidder" while negotiations continue.
The Austro-Daimler concern has survived as Steyr-Daimler-Puch, despite being absorbed by General Dynamics in 2003 ...
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daimler_Motor_Company
Daimler photos
