Frederick Simms was a founder of the British motor industry and first imported Daimler engines to the UK in 1890. He founded the RAC automobile club in 1897 and went on to manufacture magnetos for use in the automobile industry. Before the second world war he was making injector nozzles for diesel engines and due to wartime contracts expanded rapidly in the following years. In 1968 Lucas CAV bought Simms and gradually re-branded their products.