[1] He sold Buick in 1904 to James H. Whiting (1842–1919), owner of Flint (Michigan) Wagon Works, and used the money to help found the Maxwell-Briscoe Motor Company, makers of the Maxwell automobile.

[1] The company was backed by J. P. Morgan & Co. and Richard Irvin & Co., but in the panic of 1907, Briscoe had the first of many bad experience with bankers and was forced to do his own financing.

His negotiations with William C. Durant, Henry Ford, and Ransom E. Olds failed, so he proceeded to organize his own corporation along the broad lines he envisaged resulting in the United States Motor Company.

U. S. Motors continued production of the Maxwell and was soon also producing the Stoddard-Dayton car, the Brush Runabout (in which his brother Frank Briscoe was a principal), Alden-Sampson trucks, and others.

A few months after leaving U. S. Motors, he and his brother formed Briscoe Frères at Billancourt, France, home of the Renault, to design and build a car on the continent according to American methods.