Darracq and Company London

A. Darracq and Company Limited was a French manufacturer of motor vehicles and aero engines in Suresnes, near Paris. The French enterprise, known at first as A. Darracq et Cie, was founded in 1896 by Alexandre Darracq after he sold his Gladiator Bicycle business. In 1902, it took effect in 1903, he sold his new business to a privately held English company named A Darracq and Company Limited, taking a substantial shareholding and a directorship himself.

Alexandre Darracq continued to run the business from Paris but was obliged to retire to the Côte d'Azur in 1913 following years of difficulties that brought Darracq & Co into very hazardous financial circumstances. He had introduced an unproven unorthodox engine in 1911 which proved a complete failure yet he neglected Suresnes' popular conventional products. France then entered the first World War.

He died in 1931 but long before that, in 1920, the name of A Darracq & Co 1905 was changed to STD Motors Limited. Then, in 1922, Darracq's name was dropped from all products, the Suresnes business was renamed Automobiles Talbot and the Suresnes products were branded just Talbot. His Suresnes business continued, still under British control, under the name Talbot until 1935 when it was acquired by investors led by the Suresnes factory's managing director, Antonio Lago.

STD Motors Limited, previously known until 1920 as A Darracq and Company (1905) Limited became insolvent and was liquidated during 1935 and 1936.