David Brown Limited

David Brown Limited is a British engineering company, principally engaged in manufacturing gears and gearboxes, founded in 1860 as a pattern maker by David Brown and based at Park Works in Huddersfield since 1902. By 1921 it was the largest worm gear maker in the world, and its Merritt-Brown tank transmission was used in the Churchill and Centurion tanks. Sir David Brown, grandson of the founder, ran it from 1931 and built a tractor business from 1936, first with Harry Ferguson. He bought Aston Martin in 1947, Lagonda in 1948 and the coachbuilder Tickford in 1955, and the car companies were sold in 1972, the year the tractors went to Tenneco. The family sold to management in 1990, it floated in 1993, Textron bought it in 1998, and in 2016 it merged with Santasalo to form David Brown Santasalo.