Daimler Trucks North America

Daimler Trucks North America is America's leading heavy-duty vehicle manufacturer, headquartered in Portland, Oregon, with offices in Charlotte, North Carolina.

The timeline of Daimler Trucks North America is as follows:

• In the late 1930s, Leland James, president of the Portland, Oregon-based trucking company Consolidated Freightways, approached truck manufacturers with his idea of building truck components with lightweight aluminum instread of traditional steel.
• In 1940, James helped establish Freightways Manufacturing Company in Salt Lake City, Utah, to produce the vehicles.
• In 1942, the manufacturing company changed its name to Freightliner Corporation, and the company soon became North America's leading heavy-duty vehicle manufacturer.
• In 1947, Freightliner Corporation resumed truck-building operations after World War II in their new manufacturing facility in Portland, Oregon. At this time, production volumes grew from 116 vehicles in 1950, to 931 in 1960 and 6,206 in 1970.
• In 1981, Daimler-Benz AG, an automotive company and builder of heavy-duty commercial vehicles, purchased Freightliner from Consolidated Freightways. Those next several years, vehicle sales more than doubled. Daimler-Benz helped Freightliner reach the top of the North American heavy-duty truck market by 1992.
• In 1995, Oshkosh Corporation's chassis division was purchased, later becoming Freightliner Custom Chassis Corporation. In the same year, Freightliner acquired firefighting/emergency vehicle manufacturer American LaFrance.
• Two years later, they purchased the heavy truck division of Ford Motor Company and launched the Sterling brand. The next year, Freightliner acquired school bus manufacturer Thomas Built Buses.
• In 2000, they purchased Western Star Trucks and launched Unimog North America in 2003.
• The next year, Freightliner LLC opened a full-scale wind tunnel in Portland, the first wind tunnel in North America designed for and dedicated to testing full-size commercial vehicles.
• In 2007, Daimler sold the majority interest in Chrysler to Cerberus Capital Management, LP, a private equity company in New York.

Some of the company's brands include Alliance Parts, Detroit Diesel Corporation, Freightliner Custom Chassic Corporation, Freightliner Trucks, SelecTrucks, Thomas Built Buses, Western Star Trucks, Daimler Truck Financial, and Elite Support.