BBS

BBS was founded in 1970 in Schiltach, a small town in Germany's Black Forest region, by Heinrich Baumgartner and Klaus Brand. The company name combines their two surnames with 'S' for Schiltach. Both were amateur racers frustrated with the wheels available at the time, and the company started by producing fiberglass body panels for racing cars before recognizing that the bigger opportunity was in the wheels themselves.

In 1972, BBS developed a three-piece wheel construction that became hugely influential in European motorsport. The design allowed racing teams to build wheels at different widths and offsets from the same center, which made them practical and popular in the paddock. By 1983, BBS launched the Super RS, a 17-spoke mesh design that became one of the most recognizable wheels in automotive history. The Super RS remains in production today, largely unchanged from the original.

BBS built a long relationship with Formula 1, supplying forged magnesium wheels to Ferrari and other top teams and accumulating over 4,000 race wins spanning F1, touring car, rally, and endurance racing across multiple series. When Formula 1 switched from 13-inch to 18-inch wheels in 2022, BBS was named the exclusive official wheel supplier for the entire series, with all F1 wheels manufactured at their facility in Takaoka City, Japan.

Manufacturing is split between Germany, Japan, and the United States. In October 2024, KW Automotive acquired BBS's German production plants. The road wheel lineup runs from the CH-R and CH-RII flow formed wheels as an accessible entry point up through the two-piece LM and Super RS, to the fully forged FI monoblock series, which appears as factory equipment on Porsche, Ferrari, and McLaren production cars.