Accuracy International
| Accuracy International Ltd. | |
|---|---|
| legal form | Limited |
| Seat |
Crawley , West Sussex ,
|
| management | Thomas Irwin, David Walls |
| sales | £ 12.1 million |
| Branch | weapons |
| Website | www.accuracyinternational.com |
| As of December 31, 2015 | |
Accuracy International Ltd. , AI for short, is a British arms manufacturer that primarily produces sniper rifles . The company is based in Portsmouth (Hampshire, United Kingdom ).
The company was founded in 1978 by the two-time Olympic champion Malcolm Cooper and is best known today for the Arctic Warfare series.
The peculiarity of the young company was that company boss Cooper had to finance his sporting career by profit from his company, since, unlike his opponents, he hardly received any sponsorship money . In the beginning, Accuracy International primarily produced match weapons . These sporting rifles are said to have excellent functionality and accuracy, but the rifle stocks in laminated wood construction caused problems in rain and moisture. Since then, the main focus of development has been on ensuring the functionality and precision of the weapons even under the worst conditions.
The first result of these developments was the AI PM ( “Precision Match” ) sport rifle. This time, more modern materials were used, such as those used for the Steyr AUG at that time . Instead of laminated wood, the stock of this rifle now consisted of light metal struts and a polymer shell . This rifle also heralded the company's change from a pure sporting arms manufacturer to an armaments company: When the British armed forces were looking for a successor to their L42 A1 sniper rifle in the early 1980s , Accuracy International took part with a variant of the PM model (now " Precision Marksman " called) in the tender. The rifle was able to prevail against the competing product from Parker-Hale ( M85 ) and was taken into service by the British Army under the designation L96 .
A few years later, the Swedish army was also looking for a new sniper rifle that could cope with the harsh Scandinavian weather. Accuracy International revised the PM model and thus also won this tender. The Swedish Army put this rifle into service in 1988 and named it PSG 90 . Accuracy International named this version from now on Arctic Warfare (AW) to underline the reliability of the rifle - even in difficult external conditions. The British Army also became aware of this revised rifle and adopted it under the designation L96A1 . Other armies followed, including the Bundeswehr , which introduced its version as the G22 . The goal from the start was to develop a zero-maintenance weapon (in German a maintenance-free weapon ), which has succeeded well with the AW series.
In 1997 a new manufacturing facility ( Accuracy International North America Inc AINA for short) was opened in Oak Ridge ( Tennessee , USA ). Shortly before his death in 2001, Malcolm Cooper handed over the position of CEO to Graham Ryan and was only president from then on. In 2005, Accuracy International had to file for bankruptcy and was subsequently taken over by a British consortium.
Then Tom Irwin took over the company.
literature
- John Walter, Rifles of the World Verlag Krause Publications, 3rd edition, 2006, pages 14 to 15, ISBN 978-0-89689-241-5 ( Google Books )
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b The company behind the rifle used by the world's deadliest sniper . In: The Daily Telegraph . February 2, 2015 ( Telegraph.co.uk ).
- ^ Accuracy International Filing History
