History of Porsche

The history of the German brand “Porsche” began in 1931, when Ferdinand Porsche, a well-known designer of the time, who worked for Auto Union and Daimler, decided to establish his own brand of cars. Having extensive experience in working on cars for a variety of brands, as well as a doctorate in engineering, Ferdinand Porsche visited the USSR in 1930, where he was offered, together with his design staff, to move to a young socialist state and start debugging the military industry. As a result, he refused and a year later, returning to his homeland, he registered the trademark “Dr. Ing. H.C.F. Porsche GmbH.

However, the next car, which became one of the key ones in Ferdinand Porsche’s entire career, was the Volkswagen Krafter, developed in 1936 by order of Adolf Hitler personally as a people’s German car. Gradually, the rest of the German automakers began to lose their positions in the country’s car market, Ferdinand Porsche in 1939 introduced the first car under his own brand – the Porsche 64, built on the basis of the Crafter and using about 70% of the components from the first Volkswagen car.

With the outbreak of the Second World War, Porsche’s talent was in demand in the creation of military equipment, as Tiger tanks, artillery tractors and a whole line of trucks were introduced, which elevated Ferdinand Porsche to the elite of Germany. But he gravitated towards the creation of cars. Ferdinand wrote an open letter to the leadership of the country, where he stated that he was no longer going to work for a military dictatorship, for which he was deprived of all privileges, just six months before the end of the war. Porsche’s latest amphibious designs, based on the Volkswagen Beetle, and powertrains for heavy military equipment, were put into mass production in February 1945, without the consent of Ferdinand Porsche. At the same time, the designer and his son moved to Austria, where they met the end of the war.

With the overthrow of Hitler, the occupation government, where each of the parties wanted to see the famous designer as a citizen of their country, could not agree whether Porsche would be sent to the USSR or the United States of America. As a result, in December 1945, father and son were arrested. Ferdinand Anton Porsche was released from prison 20 months after his imprisonment, and the French Ministry of Justice kept the legendary designer in custody until March 1947. Ferdinand Porsche, in poor conditions of detention, seriously undermined his health, and after his release from prison he limited himself to advising his son, and gradually moved away from creating cars. The legendary designer died in 1951, and his son had to solve a number of problems, including looking for investors, due to the fact that the Austrian government seized not only all the property of the Porsche brand, but also the personal accounts of father and son.

Thanks to the financial help of the Zurich advertising agency owners, Blank and von Zenger, the re-created Porsche brand was able to move to Stuttgart, where the design headquarters and production facilities were located in the adjoining rooms of a small body repair shop for the Daimler brand.

In 1952, the lightweight 1100 model was introduced in coupe and convertible body modifications, and under the hood was a Volkswagen power unit with a capacity of 40 horsepower. By 1956, 6 more modifications of this model were presented, each of which received an increasingly powerful engine, increasing in cost and, gradually, winning its position in the market. However, in 1959, after the introduction of the Porsche B lineup, engines of their own production were introduced, which had a revolutionary dual clutch, which allowed cars to lose a minimum of power when upshifting.

In 1963, the most famous model of the company was presented, in the development of which Ferdinand Anton Porsche himself took part, the rear-wheel drive rear-engine compact coupe Porsche 911. In addition, the first modifications of Porsche cars for racing in various classes were presented. A year later, the 912 was introduced, which became a cheaper version of the 911, intended for sale in the United States of America. Under the hood of the model was a 1.6-liter four-cylinder power unit with a capacity of 90 horsepower. By 1965, more than 76 thousand copies of the brand’s models were produced.

In 1972, the Porsche company ceased to be a closed joint-stock company, becoming a public company. After the placement of shares, the Porsche-Piech family lost full control of the brand, thus retaining only a controlling stake. In the same years, the sons of Ferdinand Anton Porsche founded the Porsche Design company in parallel. However, at the same time, he had a conflict with his eldest son Ferdinand, who left the family company, going to work at Audi, later becoming the general director of the Volkswagen concern. The conflict of the descendants of the founder of the company led to the fact that Ernst Fuhrmann became the new head of the Porsche company, the Porsche family retained their seats on the board of directors.

In 1973, the brand’s models with a classic layout were introduced, which led to the emergence of a new segment of sports cars, and a year later the second generation of the 911 was introduced, which received an eight-cylinder power unit with two turbines. The engine power was 260 horsepower, but gradually sales of the model began to plummet, especially against the background of other models of the company, and in 1980 Ernst Fuhrmann was removed from his post, and with him the last Porsche 911 of the second generation left the assembly line.

In 1983, with the arrival of a new CEO, who became Peter Schutz, the former head of the American division of the brand, a new era began in the history of the company. First of all, it was decided to actively promote the brand in motorsport, a platform for the best advertising of sports cars. An agreement was signed with the McLaren Formula 1 team, which began using Porsche engines under the TAG brand in 1984-1986. For three seasons, Niki Lauda and Alain Prost became world champions, and in 48 races, 22 victories were won. However, after the start of the conflict between Ron Dennis, the head of McLaren and Peter Schutz, the Porsche program in Formula 1 was curtailed.

Also in 1984, the third generation Porsche 911 received an off-road version, which took part in the Paris-Dakar rally raid, where turbocharged engines for Formula 1 cars produced twice as much horsepower as competitors’ engines, which led the German brand led by racer René Metge to a convincing victory. Success was repeated in 1986 with the all-new Porsche 959. However, not everyone shared the fairness of light supercars with high ground clearance in the heavy off-road class, as a result of which Porsche received an official ban on participation in such competitions without a full-fledged SUV.

However, this did not bother the management of the Porsche brand much, a new plan was outlined, according to which the production of cars for private teams participating in the 24-hour Le Mans daily marathons would be curtailed, and a new Porsche racing team would be founded. . The Porsche 962C, driven by ex-Formula 1 drivers, won solid victories in 1986 and 1987.

1989 was a real year of change for the German brand Porsche. The front-engine cars of the company alternately left the stage, and a new generation of the Porsche 911 also came out, which also received a modification of the 996 Carrera. However, the company was left by Ferdinand Anton Porsche, who retired and did not want to help his successors, remaining confident that the best years of the brand were already behind. There were mass preparations of production facilities for the start of the production of a number of new models, but the economic crisis of the early 1990s made its own adjustments. By 1998, which was remembered not only for the death of the son of the founder of the company, but also for the fiftieth anniversary of the brand.

Porsche celebrated the anniversary with the release of a number of Gran Turismo models, completely redesigning the technical side of its technological developments. However, the long rivalry within the company of turbocharged and conventional engines somewhat lowered the sales of the brand. However, this did not greatly affect the well-being of the company.

Cooperation with the Volkswagen concern has reached the point where the companies began to use joint platforms, and the first model was the luxury SUV Porsche Cayenne, introduced in 2002. Under the hood, the models were located as classic engines with a capacity of 300-405 horsepower, diesel engines from the Volkswagen brand with a capacity of 240 horsepower and a new generation of turbocharged power units with a capacity of 505 horsepower.

In 2003, the Porsche Carrera Gran Turismo was introduced, which remained the fastest production car for 4 years, losing its title to Pagani Zonda at the end of 2007. In 2004, the 987 Boxster model entered the market, equipped with 2.9 and 3.4-liter engines with a capacity of 255 and 310 horsepower, respectively. In addition, Porsche factories were opened in Finland, which made it possible to increase the number of cars produced up to 190 thousand copies per year. A year later, a two-seater coupe based on the Boxster was introduced, called the Cayman.

In 2007, the Porsche family founded the Porsche SE company, which bought out 100% of the shares of the Volkswagen concern, which, in turn, received full control over Porsche AG. This year can be considered the next stage of the start of the company’s takeoff. Since 2009, more than 7 new models have been introduced, in addition to the four-door Panamera sedan, a restyled version of the Porsche Cayenne, a new generation of the Porsche 911 was introduced in 2011, which became the best-selling car in its class.