The Gloucestershire Aircraft Co was set up in 1917 to assemble warplanes in the Great War. In 1920 Henry Folland moved to the firm, after the closure of Nieuport & General Aircraft. Henry Phillip Folland began his career at the Royal Aircraft Factory, Farnborough in 1912, where he was responsible for the FE.2B, SE.4 and SE.5A. Nieuport & General Aircraft at Cricklewood had been set up in 1916 by Samuel Waring of Waring & Gillow, to licence-build the French Nieuport 17 fighter.