Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1998/08/31
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]In reply to my question about the fate of the old Wetzlar works and the Leitz family business, Eric Welch wrote: >Solms is not a company, it's a city. Leitz was sold a while back before the factory moved to Solms. Ownership has traded several times since. It's still Leica. I realised that, Eric. When I wrote the word "Solms" I was too lazy to go downstairs and look up books to determine exactly what the bit of the Wild company which set up the Solms plant called itself. I now have, so will re-ask my question - When Wild Heerbrugg AG completed its purchase of Ernst Leitz Wetzlar GmbH, was that the end of the original family-owned company or did they have other business or manufacturing activities based at the Wetzlar plant? What happened to the old works at Wetzlar? In the winter of 1987/88 did most of its staff move to the new Leica GmbH plant at Solms? What happened to the staff who'd worked on the microscopes? Reading the account given on pages 1-3 of Laney's "Leica Collectors Guide", it would seem that Ernst Leitz Wetzlar GmbH was broken up and its parts fitted into various parts of the Wild Leitz Holding AG organisation. According to Laney, the photographic division (Leitz Fotobereich) became the independent "Leica GmbH". Regards, Doug Richardson