The story
1945: Snecma was formed when the French aircraft engine manufacturer Gnome & Rhône was nationalised. The name 'Snecma' was an acronym for Société nationale d'études et de construction de moteurs d'aviation (in English: 'National Company for the Research and Construction of Aviation Engines').
1946: Initial employees were German engineers, primarily from BMW, located in Decize, France. Group was known as Groupe "O" until 1950. First design product was the ATAR engine.
1946 or 1947, the nationalized Établissments Regnier Motor Company was absorbed into Snecma and continued to produce the SNECMA Régnier 4L.
1961: Snecma and Bristol Siddeley formed a joint venture to produce a high-performance jet engine for the Concorde. The main body of the engine came from the Bristol Olympus, which was further improved with several refinements including the addition of the variable intakes necessary for supersonic flight.
1968: Snecma acquired Hispano-Suiza, Socata and Bugatti.
1970: Messier and Snecma agreed to merge their landing gear business. The following year, Messier-Hispano was formed, which was fully acquired by Snecma in 1973. Snecma's landing gear business was further consolidated by the creation of Messier-Hispano-Bugatti (later renamed Messier-Bugatti) in 1977.
1974: Snecma and General Electric (GE) created a joint venture named CFM International, beginning a long term cooperation to produce the CFM56 series of turbofan engines.
1990: Snecma announced its partnership with General Electric to build and produce the General Electric GE90 engine.
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1994: Messier-Dowty was formed following the merger of the landing gear businesses of Snecma (Messier) and the British TI Group (Dowty).
1997: Snecma fully acquired the Société européenne de propulsion.
1998: Snecma took full control of Messier-Dowty.
1999: Snecma Services was created to consolidate all maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) operations (including Sochata-Snecma).
2000: Snecma acquired Labinal, along with its Turbomeca and Microturbo subsidiaries.
2001: Hurel-Hispano (now renamed and known as Safran Nacelles) was created to consolidate the group's engine nacelle and thrust reverser business.
2005: Snecma merged with SAGEM to form Safran. Snecma was divided into two divisions of the new group (propulsion and equipment).
2010: Snecma and GE formed CFM Materials as a 50/50 joint venture.
2016: Snecma was renamed Safran Aircraft Engines as the main subsidiary of Safran.
From Wikipedia’s article on Safran Aircraft Engines, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4