Industry | Aerospace, Engineering |
---|---|
Fate | Purchased and merged into Rolls-Royce |
Successor | Rolls-Royce Limited |
Founded | 1959 | by merger
Defunct | 1966 |
Headquarters | Filton, Bristol, United Kingdom |
Products | Aircraft engines |
Bristol Siddeley Engines Ltd (BSEL) was a British aero engine manufacturer. The company was formed in 1959 by a merger of Bristol Aero-Engines Limited and Armstrong Siddeley Motors Limited. In 1961 the company was expanded by the purchase of the de Havilland Engine Company and the engine division of Blackburn Aircraft. Bristol Siddeley was purchased by Rolls-Royce Limited in 1968.
Bristol Siddeley Engines Limited was formed by a merger, effective from the 1 April 1959, of the Bristol Aero-Engines and Armstrong Siddeley Motors. These were the aero engine manufacturing companies of the Bristol Aeroplane Company and the Hawker Siddeley Group. The share capital of Bristol Siddeley was held in equal proportions by these two parent organisations. At around the same time Bristol's aircraft manufacturing was being subsumed into the British Aircraft Corporation along with those of English Electric and Vickers-Armstrong.
Armstrong Siddeley Motors had been producing aero-engines and motor-cars since it had been formed in 1919 with the merger of Siddeley-Deasy and the Armstrong Whitworth Company. Bristol Aero-Engines had been formed in 1920 when the Bristol Aeroplane Company had taken over the assets of the Cosmos Engineering Company.
On 6 May 1958 Bristol Siddeley Engines Limited was formed as a pilot company to bring about an alliance between the Bristol and Coventry concerns, and a full merger took effect from the beginning of April 1959. The purpose of the new company was to combine the research, engineering and manufacturing resources of the two great component companies to meet the changing demands of the aviation industry.