It all started with two different ideas from two different men with two different cars. Gottlieb Daimler and Karl Benz each created their own companies, manufacturing their own cars. Their companies produced brilliant automobiles as rivals for about 30 years, until economic ties caused their two respectful companies to merge and create what today is the greatest automobile in the world. Here is a brief history of the Mercedes Benz from it's early days as a motor cycle engine to today's ground breaking automobile.
1871, at the age of 27, Karl Benz got together with a partner August Ritter in Mannheim to form his first company, the "Iron Foundry and Machine Shop". Not long after, the two partners went their separate ways and Karl Benz started a company of his own. By 1879/80, eight years after his company was founded, Karl Benz had developed his first working two-stroke engine.