In 1999, Pinkerton was acquired by the Swedish security company, Securitas AB, to form the largest security company in the world.

The History of Pinkerton

‘Pinkerton’ is perhaps the best known security company in the United States and is now recognised all around the world. The name came from the Scot, Allan Pinkerton, who established the Pinkerton Detective Agency in the 1850’s in the United States. The Agency’s logo depicted an open eye with the words ‘We Never Sleep’ beneath it, which over time gave rise to the now well known expression ‘private eye’. The eye remains the logo of Pinkerton today. In more recent years,

Pinkerton grew into one of the largest security service companies in the US specialising in the provision of manned guarding services.
The original Detective Agency’s legacy, however, still exists today in the form of Pinkerton Consulting & Investigations (PC&I), the commercial investigation and consultancy division of Pinkerton. PC&I now has offices located throughout North and South America, Europe and Asia.

PC&I nowadays provides security consulting and investigation services to its clients worldwide taking advantage of the Company’s global reach whilst also ensuring a local focus.

The History of Securitas

Securitas was founded in 1934 in Helsinborg, Sweden. Initially, Securitas only had operations in Sweden. In 1989, the first steps were taken towards the internationalisation of the company with the acquisition of security companies in Norway, Denmark, Portugal and Hungary. The company became publicly owned in 1991 and is quoted on the Swedish Stock Exchange. This led to further expansion in Spain, France, Germany, Austria and Switzerland in 1992. Between 1993 and 1997 further acquisitions then took place in Finland, Great Britain, Poland, and Estonia.

Securitas moved into the North American market with the acquisition of Pinkerton in 1999 followed by Burns International in 2000.

The Company specialises in providing cash-in-transit, security guarding and domestic alarm services across Europe and North America. Today, the Securitas group of companies has over 300 offices in more than 30 countries worldwide with revenues of US$6 billion and more than 210,000 employees.