The company was founded under the name Lang & Co. in 1865 by the German cement pioneer Wilhelm Gustav Dyckerhoff (1805–1894) in Karlsruhe, Germany.

Starting in the field of construction engineering in the 1880s, the company soon got contracts for impressive buildings like the Centennial Hall (Jahrhunderthalle) in Wroclaw.

For this concrete shell construction system the company was awarded an Edward Longstreth Medal of Merit by the Franklin Institute in 1938.

The company Dyckerhoff & Widmann also played an important role for the establishment of prestressed concrete and the cantilever method in Germany.

During World War II Dyckerhoff & Widmann used slave labour from Camp No.