Diehl is an internationally active family-owned company headquartered in Nuremberg. Heinrich and Margarete Diehl founded the business in 1902 as an art foundry and model-making workshop. After the Second World War, Diehl began producing its own clocks. Its standard alarm clock was launched in 1948. In 1957, Diehl acquired a majority shareholding in the Junghans clock and watch factory. Clock and watch production remained part of the company until the sale of Diehl's timepiece division in 2000. Since 2010, Diehl has organised its activities into five independent corporate divisions: Metall, Controls, Defence, Aviation and Metering. Karl Diehl's wish to preserve the business as an independent family-owned company continued to shape it after his death on 19 January 2008. When the fourth generation of the family joined the shareholder group in 2012, that responsibility passed to the next generation.