The story
The company was founded by Tony Ellsworth. In 1991, Tony Ellsworth built his first bicycle frame after a dramatic career change was brought on by deteriorating health. He built his first full-suspension mountain bike for his wife in 1993. By 1994, Tony was building bikes "for people whose names he didn't know," at which point he considered that he indeed built himself a business.
September 2014: BST Nano Carbon acquired Ellsworth. BST shifted the brand's location from Ramona, CA, to San Diego, CA. BST re-focused the brand to keep up with the industry-trend of manufacturing carbon fiber frames and updated their lineup's frame geometry to follow suit. BST planned on manufacturing the brand's frames and components at its San Diego facility, and they moved the aluminium frames to be manufactured by a separate Southern California vendor. Ellsworth did not release any bikes in 2015 as BST underestimated the costs associated with producing carbon fiber frames in California.
January 2016: Jonathan Freeman, a private investor from San Diego, bought the company from BST—the new owner bringing in much needed capital for the 25-year-old brand. Freeman worked hand-in-hand with Tony to bring a new and updated product range including both carbon fiber and aluminium alloy frames. The frames are produced in Taiwan and are assembled in San Diego, CA.
May 2018: South African Ellsworth Distributor, ASG Group, acquires Ellsworth. Ellsworth currently operates from its new facility in San Diego, CA, as a subsidiary of ASG North America. ASG also distributes other house brands into U.S., including SCICON.
December 2021: Ellsworth bicycles is acquired by RP Designs. Tony Ellsworth rejoins the company as Chief Development/Design Officer. Ellsworth announces intent to bring manufacturing to the United States, and to launch two bicycle models.
From Wikipedia’s article on Ellsworth Handcrafted Bicycles, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.3