Carl Zeiss AG previously had purchased a minority stake in Voigtländer in the 1940s and acquired the remainder of the company in 1956;
Voigtländer released the
Bessamatic/
Ultramatic line of SLRs with
leaf shutters and
DKL-mount interchangeable lenses in the early 1960s, in direct competition with the Contaflex line. Voigtländer next developed a
Bessaflex SLR prototype with a
focal plane shutter by 1963 as a replacement for the Bessamatic/Ultramatic, but further development was paused as it would have competed in the same market segment against the existing Contaflex SLR line. However, faced with competition both at the high end for its Contarex line, and at the low end for the Contaflex, Zeiss Ikon decided to bring the
Bessaflex project to market in 1966 as the
Icarex 35. The release of the
Icarex 35 in 1966 demonstrated the Voigtländer unit had been integrated completely into Zeiss Ikon. The
Icarex 35 had significant disadvantages compared to the competition at launch; there were no fast normal lenses, and neither of the two viewfinders (an eye-level
pentaprism or folding waist-level finder) had an internal
light meter. and an uncoupled through-the-lens (TTL) metering eye-level pentaprism, which also was offered and sold bundled with the camera as the
Icarex 35CS. The Voigtländer brand and
SL 706 design were acquired by Rollei, which moved production to Singapore and first sold it with few changes as the Voigtländer
VSL 1 starting from 1974, then later adapted it for its SL35 line as the
SL35 M, released in 1976. but it was produced and sold as the
Contaflex 126 starting from 1967. Contaflex 126 lenses are not physically compatible with either Icarex lens mount. ==Lenses==