History of the IKS (ohio knife co.)

Our roots can be traced back to two companies that began their respective businesses over 100 years ago in different parts of the world, the United States and Europe. In the USA, a family owned enterprise called The Ohio Knife Company began business in 1898 in Cincinnati, Ohio in a unique area known as one of the machine tool hubs of the United States. After many decades of market domination hard times eventually fell on Ohio Knife Company and key management, driven by the entrepreneurial spirit, broke out on their own forming a new industrial knife company called AMERICAN CUSTOM METALS or ACM. With renewed vigor and a high degree of attention to quality combined with exceptional service, ACM grew to become a world-recognized manufacturer of industrial machine cutting tools. 

The explosive growth of ACM caught the attention of a family owned German toolmaker that had a long and storied history of precision built machine knives. The German company had previously expanded their world operations in 1970 by purchasing a small knife and saw manufacturing company in South Carolina called HANNACO, a manufacturer of wood cutting saws and knives. It was not long before Hannaco and ACM joined forces, merged into one company, and INTERNATIONAL KNIFE AND SAW (IKS) was born. In 1986 at a liquidation sale of the Ohio Knife Corporations assets, IKS purchased industrial knife manufacturing equipment, inventory, blueprints and customer files for $410,000. These purchased assets, when combined with the IKS employee knowledge and manufacturing capabilities, launched IKS on the road to becoming a true industry leader, providing technical expertise and precision built products to customers throughout the world. 

In 2001, International Knife and Saw separated into two independent and individually owned companies, one headquartered in the United States and one in Germany. The IKS-USA owned company soon merged with their largest wood market competitor, Simonds Industries, and the two companies became known as Simonds International.

Simonds quickly reconized the value in the products sold with the IKS brand name that reached into the markets of Tissue, Paper, Metal, Food Processing and Packaging.  Simonds continued to manufacture and market IKS products from the Florence, SC location until July 2006, when a strategic decision was made to divest themselves of the all the IKS products. Included in the divestiture was the Florence plant and related facilities in Canada and Mexico that were producing and marketing these IKS products.

With the looming sale of the IKS product lines and the closing of the South Carolina plant, four veteran managers, each with a strong background in the machine knife business and specifically in the IKS brands, recognized an opportunity, formed a partnership and acquired the IKS product lines and all related manufacturing assets from Simonds. The new ownership team quickly decided it was time to go back to the roots of their product lines and thus they have named their new company INTERNATIONAL KNIFE AND SAW (IKS) while also committing to strengthening the IKS operations in South Carolina, Canada and Mexico along with the many sales channels strategically located throughout various regions in the world.